New Haven, CT – Global nonprofit Echoing Green announced that Yale University graduate students Wendell Adjetey and Etienne Mashuli have been awarded a highly competitive and coveted Fellowship to help launch Tujenge Africa Foundation, which will build the first English language preparatory school and the first public library in Bujumbura, Burundi. The Fellowship will provide seed funding, mentoring and leadership opportunities as the project develops in the next two years.
“We are grateful that Echoing Green has seen a lot of promise in us and the work we hope to accomplish in Burundi,” noted Etienne Mashuli, a Rwandan-American who recently completed his master’s in African Studies. “By educating the poor and the brightest, we hope to shape meaningfully Burundi’s future.”
According to his co-founder Wendell Adjetey, a Ghanaian-Canadian doctoral candidate in the Department of History and the Department of African American Studies, “Burundi is the land that time and humankind have forgotten, frankly, and we want to help put her on the map. As quiet champions of quality education, I’m thrilled that the Echoing Green Fellowship will position Etienne and I to play a modest role in Burundi’s nation-building efforts.”
Of 3,629 applicants, 52—just over one percent—were selected to receive Fellowships. Through three Fellowship categories (Global, Climate and Black Male Achievement), Echoing Green has invested almost $40 million in seed-stage funding and strategic assistance to nearly 700 world-class leaders. Echoing Green also supports the Fellow community long after their initial funding period through ongoing programs and opportunities at critical points in their careers.
The enterprising pair will receive $90,000 in funding for two years, participate in leadership development events, receive mentoring from leading business professionals and, most importantly, become part of a global network of leaders.
“We’re proud to be investing in tomorrow’s leaders, helping them go further, faster, as they realize their vision of a world changed for the better,” said Echoing Green President Dr. Cheryl Dorsey. “Many of the Fellows chosen are leading projects in the earliest stages, when it is hardest to find the necessary resources to get off the ground.”
Echoing Green’s Fellowship program is made possible through private contributions and the generous support of funders, including the Walton Family Foundation, the U.S. Global Development Lab of USAID, the Jerome L. Greene Foundation, The ZOOM Foundation, and the Campaign for Black Male Achievement, with support from the Open Society Foundations.
About Echoing Green:
Echoing Green’s mission is to unleash next generation talent to solve the world’s biggest problems. Echoing Green was one of the first organizations to invest in early-stage social entrepreneurs through our Fellowship program almost 30 years ago. Today, the organization remains focused on building a global community of emerging leaders in social change. To date, the organization has supported almost 700 organizations led by the most extraordinary purpose-driven leaders of our time. Echoing Green Fellows include the founders of Teach For America, City Year, One Acre Fund, The Global Fund for Children and SKS Microfinance. Echoing Green’s accelerator programming and investments help these leaders to go further, faster. Echoing Green also runs a suite of innovative programs that cultivate and support promising leaders, including programming dedicated to purpose development, board leader preparation, and impact investing.
Learn More: echoinggreen.org