Diploma student prizes (2024 cohort)
August 27, 2025Each year, WildCRU recognises the brilliant research that all of our Diploma students undertake during their time with us.
From the 2024 cohort, we are delighted to award Darya Assil the Kennedy Kariuki Prize for PGDip in IWCP Best Research Project and Melisa Lera the Meshach Pierre Prize for PGDip in IWCP Outstanding Student.
During the Diploma, Darya assessed interspecific interactions between brown hyenas and sympatric apex predators in Gonarezhou National Park, Zimbabwe, using multi-species occupancy modelling. As Africa’s rarest hyaena species, the brown hyaena plays a vital role in the ecosystem’s nutrient cycling and dispersion, but the conservation of this “Near Threatened” species is hampered by negative public perceptions and habitat loss. Darya used a multi-species occupancy model to evaluate whether the occurrence of lions and spotted hyaenas supported or created competition with brown hyaenas. The research revealed no significant evidence for any effect of these predators on brown hyaena occupancy and future research could advise effective conservation of their populations and habitats.
Meanwhile, Melisa’s Diploma project focussed on gaining insights on the novel predation of pumas on Magellanic penguins in Monte León National Park, Argentina. Melissa modelled future survival of the Magellanic penguin colony, simulating scenarios under different puma predation pressure, initial population sizes and reproductive rates. The research showed that puma predation occurs throughout the entire colony area, with a focus on the southern and northern tips, and an average of 1.04% of all breeding adult penguins are killed every season. Melissa’s work provides insights into conservation actions that should be planned to prevent extinction of this Argentinian penguin colony.
The awards are given in memory of Kennedy and Meshach, who both completed the Diploma programme with WildCRU in 2015 and 2018, respectively.
Diploma Lead Tutor, Egil Droge, shares that “Meshach was a wonderful young man from Guyana. An avid bird watcher and photographer with a vision of what he wanted to do. He wanted to investigate wildlife (bird) trade, and cultural practices involving birds. He even did a Master’s course in criminology for that in Florida.”
Meanwhile, Diploma Director Claudio Sillero remembers that “Kennedy was a talented Kenyan conservationist with a passion for lion conservation. After his time at Oxford, he studied lions in Meru for his MSc at the University of Antwerp and was working on human-lion conflict for a PhD with Leiden University in the Netherlands”.
Both were enthusiastic conservationists who made valuable contributions to wildlife research and conservation at WildCRU and in their home countries. Their legacy lives on in enthusiastic students like Darya and Melisa.