On 27 June 2026, the SHESA President General and Executive Leadership convened the first SHESA Presidential Summit at the WDC Apartment Hotel, under the theme "Strengthening SHESA Unity through Strategic Governance, Digital Transformation, and Global Batch Integration."
It was a consultative assembly, not a ceremony. Representatives from 26 batches and 10 branches sat with six Past Presidents General, adviser members, and branch presidents to examine what is working in SHESA, what is not, and what the Association must become.
A plan for five years
The centre piece was the SHESA Strategic Plan (2026–2030), built on four priorities: institutional unity and excellence in governance; membership engagement and professional connectivity; financial sustainability and institutional credibility; and strategic partnerships for broader societal impact.
Panel sessions with past President Generals and adviser members traced where SHESA has come from. Branch presidents from Bafoussam, Bamenda, Yaoundé, Tiko and Douala spoke to the realities on the ground, and batch representatives from 1965, 1974 and 1995 set out how cohorts could be brought properly into the fold.
SHESA Connect
The Summit received the SHESA Connect Digital Application; a modernized website, secure financial management, professional networking tools, mentorship and career development, and better channels for communication across the global community. Delegates accepted it as a strategic instrument for transparency, inclusion and member growth, and designated it a major institutional transformation initiative.
Bringing batches in
Delegates agreed that graduation-year batches carry real social capital and mobilization capacity, and that they should be integrated into the SHESA structure through a formal special status framework — registering as batches, paying annual dues, and meeting an eligibility standard tied to branch membership. Recognized batch members will enjoy membership rights, with defined exceptions relating to elective office and the hosting of Annual General Meetings. The framework strengthens the branch structure rather than replacing it.
Constitutional reform
The plenary on constitutional amendments produced recommendations for the General Assembly, among them:
- Executive members serving a three-year term, renewable once;
- The Treasurer as custodian of Association funds, with the Financial Secretary as co-signatory to SHESA accounts;
- Independent auditors endorsed by the General Assembly on the proposal of the NEC, with selection criteria and audit mechanism set out in an Audit Manual;
- Clear quorum requirements for Annual General Meetings;
- A Solidarity Scheme for fallen bonafide SHESANs, governed by a policy paper defining dues, eligibility and usage.
Seven recommendations to the General Assembly
The Summit forwarded a policy package for adoption: an integrated global governance architecture, including a SHESA Global Governing Council chaired by the President General and comprising all Country Presidents, and a Permanent Secretariat based in Cameroon to hold the Association's archives and institutional memory; a batch integration framework; a lifelong membership and senior alumni recognition policy; SHESA Connect as the digital backbone; a financial governance and accountability framework; a global engagement and partnership model, including support for Sacred Heart College Mankon; and a monitoring and evaluation framework reporting periodically to the General Assembly.
Resolutions
Delegates resolved to implement the Strategic Plan, deploy SHESA Connect across all structures, strengthen collaboration among branches, batches and country chapters, maintain one logo and one official uniform worldwide, maintain one SHESA secretariat, continue constitutional reform at batch and country chapter level, improve transparency and financial governance, and pursue global integration while preserving SHESA's traditions.
Financing the Summit
The Presidential Summit is an innovation of the Executive Committee and falls outside SHESA's traditional budget lines, so it was financed by contributions mobilized from batches and branches.
The Summit closed with a commitment to implement its resolutions and to build a more united, accountable, digitally connected and globally integrated SHESA.