Scholars@10 Virtual Event – August 2022
Catalyzing Impact in Our Communities
Date: August 17th, 2022 at 6:00 pm EAT/ 3:00 pm GMT/ 11:00pm EST
Since launching in 2012, the Scholar Program has grown to become one of the largest scholarship initiatives of its kind in Africa working with more than 40 partners global partners and enabling nearly 40,000 young people to pursue secondary or tertiary education and gain the skills they need to become the next generation of transformative African leaders.
On the heels of our last event “Reflections from the Last Decade”, this virtual event will celebrate one of the key pillars of the Scholars Program; the Collective Impact of Our Community. We will look back on the impact the program has catalyzed within communities and discuss our renewed focus for the next 10 years.
Watch the conversation on Catalyzing Impact in Our Communities.
Event Details
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Moderator
Waringa Kamau
Waringa Kamau is a storyteller based in Nairobi, Kenya. Professionally, she has experience ranging from working as a communications professional in the technology industry and development world, to working as a reporter in leading newsrooms worldwide, such as CNN International in Atlanta, Georgia, Bloomberg News in New York, and Al Jazeera in San Francisco, California. Waringa believes in the power of storytelling to normalize and break the silence around issues that are often considered taboo. This has led her to start her YouTube channel, Mental Safe Space, where she hosts insightful conversations on all things Mental Health. Waringa graduated from Washington and Lee University with a BA in Journalism & Mass Communications, specializing in business reporting. She also holds a Master of Journalism from the University of California, Berkeley, where she was a MasterCard Foundation Scholar. Waringa is also a proud plant mum, fitness and travel enthusiast, and a creative, fearless dreamer.Speakers
Ubah Ali
Ubah Ali is a social activist from Somaliland pursuing a master’s in International Conflict and Cooperation at the University of Stirling. Ali completed her bachelor’s degree in Political Science and International Law at the American University of Beirut. In 2020, she was listed by the BBC as one of the world’s most influential 100 Women due to her campaign against injustices both in Lebanon and Somaliland.
John Diing
John Diing is an agronomist by profession. An alumni of the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program, he currently works as an admissions specialist helping young people from Africa get opportunities to study at EARTH University in Costa Rica through the Scholars Program. His understanding of the refugees’ problems and their context has been a great help in designing sustainable solutions. He is a co-founder at STPI, where he supports local farmers with agronomic skills to increase their farm production in northern Kenya. He serves as a member of the Youth Advisory Group of The Global Opportunity Youth Initiative (GOYI) where he advises the GOYI leadership team and its partner NGOs on the best strategies to address youth problems.
Benjamin Obeng
Benjamin Obeng is an engineer, inventor, entrepreneur and a Mastercard Foundation Scholar alum. He graduated from Arizona State University with a masters degree in Mechanical Engineering. At ASU, Benjamin and 3 professors invented the thermogalvanic brick, a building material capable of generating electricity using temperature difference across walls; making buildings greener and more efficient. As an innovative leader and entrepreneur with a strong resilience to push past the status quo, Benjamin the founder and CEO of 3Dinkra and Zyleme both in Ghana. 3Dinkra is a 3d printing startup focused on boosting multiple industries on the continent using additive manufacturing. In the heights of COVID-19, 3Dinkra supported hospitals with locally manufactured face shields and spare parts for medical equipment. Aside the medical, education and movie industries, 3Dinkra works in jewelry industry where they leverage on 3d printing to leapfrog conventional methods of jewelry manufacturing to add value to Ghana’s local resources.Benjamin is currently the lead additive manufacturing engineer at Siemens in New York, USA. Last year, he was one of the few youths selected globally to have an intergenerational dialogue with the United Nations to discuss The Future Agenda. As a Da Vinci Award recipient and passionate about Africa’s development, Benjamin is usually a guest speaker at conferences on the future of manufacturing on the continent and a firm believer of African innovation.
Shona Bezanson
Shona Bezanson is Head of Regional Programs, Eastern and Southern Africa at the Mastercard Foundation. In this role, she is responsible for leading the Regional Programs strategy in a variety of portfolios, including strategy and program design, implementation, resource planning and management, innovation, learning, and program integration. Shona joined the Mastercard Foundation in 2013 as part of the Scholars Program team. In her nine years at the Mastercard Foundation, Shona has contributed to the expansion and evolution of the Scholars Program, as well as the Foundation’s regional initiatives and enterprise-wide efforts related to gender, inclusion, and safeguarding. Before joining the Foundation, Shona was a child protection advisor at Save the Children in Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Chad. She also previously worked for Right To Play and the Catholic Office for Emergency Relief and Refugees in Thailand. Shona is an eternal optimist who is passionate about peace, justice, and creating opportunities for young people. She is a graduate of Dalhousie University and Mount Allison University, in Canada, and lives with her family in Kigali, Rwanda.Highlights
Learn more about the Scholars Program and the impact over the last 10 years.
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