The psychologist Melissa Angélica Lemus García and the communication scientist Leonor Lucia González Quiñónez had recommended themselves for further tasks through their professional commitment and success as lecturers at the Jesuit University Rafael Landívar (URL) in Guatemala. The university management therefore selected them to study for a Master's degree in Social Work (specialising in Education and Integration) at the Catholic University of Applied Sciences NRW (Aachen campus). The background to this decision was a project jointly supported by the KAAD, the URL and the Catholic University of Applied Sciences NRW, namely the establishment of a Master's degree programme in "Social Pedagogy" at the URL, which the young academics were to help shape and lead. The new degree programme was designed as an offer to the church in Central America to provide staff for child and youth pastoral care with advanced training at a high professional level. In spring 2014, both women were awarded the scholarship for the Aachen programme.

Melissa Lemus and Leonor González quickly and very successfully completed the Master's programme and returned to Guatemala in 2016, where they developed a curriculum alongside their teaching duties and together with professors from Aachen.

As a result, the part-time Master's degree programme in Social Pedagogy could be offered at the URL as early as 2019, for which deserving KAAD alumni and alumnae were recruited as teaching staff. (Image: Melissa Lemus, centre, Leonor González, right)

With the support of the Diocese of Rottenburg-Stuttgart and the KAAD, the first nine scholarship holders were able to successfully complete their Master's degree at the end of 2021. A further eight began their studies in January 2022 and are about to graduate. Another fifteen scholarships were awarded for the start of the programme in January 2024.