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Janestic Mwende Twikirize is an Associate Professor of Social Work at Makerere University, Uganda. She is a Co-investigator on the multi-partner, NORHED project called RESILIENT, which aims to contribute towards building resilient communities in East Africa through inclusive education. She coordinates the Social Labs work package under this project.
Janestic is also a Social Development Consultant, with rich experience in child protection, gender, and social service workforce strengthening. She consults for government and development partner organisations particularly in the areas of child protection, social service systems strengthening, gender-based violence, and adolescent sexual reproductive health and rights. Her recent recent projects include the development of the National Framework for Strengthening the Social Service Workforce (SSW) in Uganda, as part of the overall Social Care and Support Operational Framework in 2022; and Technical Lead on the a mapping and assessment of the social service workforce in Zimbabwe. She has led a series of SSW strengthening projects including conducting a nation-wide training needs assessment; development of a capacity building/training curriculum on multisectoral case management and adolescent and youth engagement and also led the development of a national competency framework and a national strategy for continuous professional development for SSW.
She has published more than six books on social work in Africa with specific focus on indigenization of methodologies and approaches; has over 25 journal articles and book chapters, and made more than 30 international conference presentations in the last 6 years including several invited keynote/plenary presentations. She previously served as Vice President of the Association of Schools of Social Work in Africa and also as Africa’s representative on the Board of the International Association of schools of Social Work.