In the second of our series of Scholar profiles Eszter Kabos, an Oxford-Weidenfeld and Hoffmann-Sackler Scholar, describes her route to Oxford and what she gets from her studies and the WHT Leadership Programme. Eszter is currently studying for an MPhil in Economics.

Economics gives me puzzles, and I try to solve them like a mathematician but also as an economist. At Oxford I am currently focusing on microeconomic theory while trying to find ways to apply it to real world problems within and outside of social sciences. Read more…

Oxford-Weidenfeld and Hoffmann Scholar Julia Standish-White kicks off a new series of blog posts profiling Scholars’ motivations for applying for the WHT Scholarship and Leadership programme, their academic interests, the impact of their time at Oxford and their future plans.

“In 2016, I was studying Psychology at the University of Cape Town and I realised that the individual focus of the discipline did not align entirely with the high levels of poverty, health inequality, and dissatisfaction that vast numbers of people in South Africa face. I became interested in learning about large-scale, evidence-based, social interventions and how they might be better equipped to meet the needs of the South African population. I was accepted onto the Masters in Evidence-based Social Intervention and Policy Evaluation programme at Oxford, and I believed that the opportunities that would arise from studying this at Oxford would allow me to return to South Africa in a much stronger position to effect meaningful change in the country.

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“The question is no longer what are you doing to do to change the world, it’s how you are going to change the world”.

With those words, Dean Peter Tufano opened the Social Impact Careers Conference at the Saïd Business School on Friday morning. This conveyed the mood for the conference proceedings: one of optimism, urgency and responsibility. The Conference was geared towards encouraging delegates to choose career paths that had a social impact, and the bigger that impact was, the better. As a student finishing up my Masters in Social Intervention and Policy Evaluation here at the University of Oxford, I was excited to attend the Conference, and gain a deeper sense of what such a career path might look like. The Conference certainly delivered on this, as well as on providing me with some practical next steps to pursuing this path.

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Stories are powerful. They reflect what we socially consider good, valuable, and desirable. As we encounter them from a young age, stories inevitably influence our social imaginaries – that is, our worldviews, values and practices – by providing us with frames of reference and meaning. However, as stories produce and reproduce socially accepted values and expectations, they can come to function as a site for the reproduction of hegemonic norms.

Project poster

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Globally, Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) affect over one billion people. Most of the affected lack access to basic Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) services and yet WASH is critical in the prevention and care of all NTDs (WHO, 2015).

Lydia’s Probono work supported the local government in increasing access to water, sanitation and hygiene services in 5 of the 46 villages affected by Podoconiosis (non-filarial elephantiasis) in Busiriba Sub-county, Kamwenge District.
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In partial fulfilment of the MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management and with financial support from the Weidenfeld-Hoffman Trust, I undertook a project to investigate the link between the level of public engagement in water services and the adoption of water conservation practices by water users. The research was conducted from 1st June to 28th July 2017 in the city of Masvingo, Zimbabwe. The first objective was to explore the current state of public participation in Masvingo’s water services sector and to establish the ways in which it relates to water conservation practices by residents. Second, the research identified the current water conservation practices being implemented by the water users in the city. Third, the research sought to identify the determinants of water conservation among the residents of Masvingo. An analysis of the findings from the aforementioned objectives was conducted. The analysis established how the city water utility should go about consulting the public in order to adopt water conservation practices fully. It also addressed the policy implications of these findings for water conservation programmes in Zimbabwe and other countries.

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With the support from the WHT I could develop my MSc dissertation fieldwork in South Africa.
The purpose of my study was to research how to implement photography to current aerial monitoring methods to get more detailed information (e.g. sex, age, and other demographics) from wildlife surveys, using Cape buffalo as a case study.

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