Kwaku Arhin-Sam is a postdoctoral researcher with interest in intervention evaluation, international migration and migration governance, integration, and belonging politics. He is currently heading the Friedensau Institute for Evaluation and sees himself as a bridge between academic and practice.  He has taught, researched, and worked in Ghana, Germany, Nigeria, Haiti, Ukraine, Albania, and Thailand. He has worked as a policy/expert consultant for the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), the Mercator Dialogue on Migration and Asylum (MEDAM), and Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ). Since 2012, Kwaku has worked as an external project/program evaluator for several organizations, including the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. He is an alumnus of Friedensau Adventist University and has been a guest lecturer in Friedensau since 2013. Kwaku is an Afropolitan and a member of the African Studies Association of Africa, and the Africa-Europe Group for Interdisciplinary Studies (AEGIS).

Jill Philine Blau is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Development Studies and coordinates this Master’s program. She has taught and researched in Germany, Ghana and Ethiopia. Her research mainly looks at the interface of feminism, pastoralism and natural commons. In this program, she furthermore teaches on the legacies of the aid industry as well as skills-based courses such as academic writing, rhetorics and participatory project planning. Before returning to research, she was Head of Department for International Politics at the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation as well as in the Board of Trustees for OWEN e.V. and the German Women’s Security Council. She started her career in development working for the GIZ and the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development.

Daniel Bendix is a Professor for Global Development. He previously taught and researched in Berlin, Manchester, Jena and Kassel. His research focuses on colonial power in development policy, the politics of reproductive health and population, post-development in the North, and transnational activism against deportation and landgrabbing. In this Master’s program, he teaches development theory and public health amongst others. He is a member of the network Afrique-Europe-Interact and of glokal, a Berlin based association for postcolonial education.

Ulrike Schultz is a Professor for Development Sociology and the Head of the full time development studies program in Friedensau. Before coming to Friedensau, she taught in Berlin, Bochum and Khartoum.  Her main research fields are migration, refugee and mobility studies and gender, and intersectionality. In her current research project, she looks at belonging and citizenship in the context of migration in the two Sudans. Her regional focus lies in North East Africa and East Africa. A special interest in her academic life lies in the cooperation with universities in the so-called Global South. She conducted workshops and summer schools in Sudan, Ghana, Nigeria and Myanmar. In this Master’s program, she is responsible for the gender and the migration courses, the social protection module and teaches qualitative methods, which is another passion in her academic career.

Thomas Spiegler is a Professor of Sociology and Methods of Social Research (and Dean of the School of Social Sciences) at Friedensau Adventist University. His main research field is the sociology of education with a focus on educational inequalities. In this Master’s program, he teaches methods of social research and statistics. One of his passions is to explain statistics as easily understandable as possible.  He has just published a new textbook about it in German and hopes to work on a more global version in English soon.

Saijue Annette Witherspoon is a doctoral researcher in the field of Development Sociology.  She has taught, conducted research and worked in Germany, Liberia, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Madagascar. Her current research analyzes power relations in agricultural value chains is a part of a larger transdisciplinary sustainable land use project hosted at the University of Göttingen, Germany. Throughout her career Ms. Witherspoon has remained at the intersection of research and practice. She has had the opportunity to freelance with Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) and Mercy Corps in the areas of programing, project monitoring, evaluation and compliance, emergency responds coordination and in rapid research operations during the 2014 Ebola outbreak. Ms. Witherspoon is an alumina of the Friedensau Adventist University and has since 2014 served as a guest lecturer in the Master program. She offers seminars and workshops in the courses participatory project planning and public health.