News

Four gifted first-year students — Daniel Ekonde of Cameroon, James Mawien Manyuol of South Sudan, Victor Ochieng of Kenya and Jennifer Ugwa of Nigeria — are this year’s Mastercard Foundation Scholars at UC Berkeley Journalism, part of a campuswide program in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation that covers the educational costs of students seeking master’s degrees.

Gloria Kahamba was recently named among the Top 25 Women in Management Africa and was featured in 9to5Chick’s Top 100 Career Women in Africa, which testifies to the leader she has become on the African continent. She was a Mastercard Foundation Scholar at UC Berkeley, earning her master’s degree in Public Health.

The LL.M. Program shares profiles of the first three LL.M. Mastercard Foundation Scholars at UC Berkeley: Hudheifa Aden from Somalia, Agbor Tabe from Cameroon, and Getachew Gayzibayso from Ethiopia.

Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program Alumnus Michael Omeka delivers a TEDTalk about his journey to the United States. Check out his talk here!

Carlos Mureithi wanted to become a professional writer so that he could tell important stories. The master’s in journalism degree program at UC Berkeley was able to provide Mureithi with the resources and training that he needed to become an international journalist. He now works as the Africa climate and environment correspondent for the Associated Press.

Linus Unah is a UC Berkeley alumnus with the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program who obtained a master's  degree in journalism. Read here about his exciting career advancing wildlife conservation with Wild Africa Fund.

Ravina and Rushika Pattni are two exceptional women making a difference in Tanzania and beyond on the African continent. Ravina is also a former Mastercard Foundation Scholar from UC Berkeley. Read about the journies and impactful work of these two transformative leaders here.

The International House at UC Berkeley is commemorating Black History Month through a YouTube video series. In consists of clips from residents, including many Mastercard Foundation Scholars, as well as alumni interviews by Scholar and I-House Global Community Ambassador, Excellence Joshua. More videos are added to the playlist throughout the month of February.

This Blum Center feature focuses on Mastercard Foundation Scholar Alum, Patricia Quaye (Development Engineering, '22) and her project, SHE 4 Change, which works with rural women in Ghana to break cycles of poverty through fashion and expanded markets. Quaye has further developed her project as a recipient of Mastercard Foundation Alumni Scholars Impact Award, powered by the Blum Center's Big Ideas Contest

Scholar Alum, Carlos Mureithi ('19, Journalism), has joined AP (Associated Press) as their Africa climate correspondent based in Nairobi, Kenya. His first story for AP was on the Three Basins Summit to protect largest tropical forest basins that took place in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo.  

The UC Berkeley Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program supported this collaboration by UC Berkeley & University of Nairobi Collaboration on a six-week “Virtual Global Innovation Workshop” on biomedical equipment design for low-resource settings through a Faculty Seed Grant. Scholar Alum, Cecil Chikezie, M.Eng/2022, was the project manager of the workshop.

Via a collaboration with the Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology and Ashesi University in Ghana, the Center for African Studies via the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program, is able to bring five Ashesi undergraduate innovators to UC Berkeley. The students include Abigail Efua Tetteh (Ghana), Judercio Nhauche (Mozambique), Mcebo Vincent Hlanze (Eswatini), Sandra Nettey (Ghana), and Styve Zeumo Lekane (Cameroon).

Hon. Patricie Uwase ('15, Civil and Environmental Engineering), Rwandan Minister of State for Infrastructure, provides insights on her journey at the Mastercard Foundations Scholars@10 Baobab Summit that took place in Kigali September 15th to 17th, 2022.

Are you a prospective master's student from Sub-Saharan Africa? Do you know someone who is? This year, we took part in the Berkeley Graduate Diversity Admissions Fair, October 17 – 21, 2022. Our session was on Tuesday, October 18 at 9:00 am PST (California time) / 4pm WAT / 7 pm EAT.

If you missed the session, you can view the video recording.

The tenth anniversary of the Scholars Program at UC Berkeley was one of several anniversaries featured in a back-to-school story, "No shortage of good news as fall semester 2022 begins at UC Berkeley" published by Berkeley Public Affairs. Scroll to near the end (85%) for the section on the Scholars Program. Alumni, such as Patricie Uwase, Vicentia Gyau and Abraham Martei Martey are featured.

Global Custodians Academy graduated it first class on 18 December 2021. The Academy was founded by two Scholar alums, Vicentia Gyau and Abraham Martey (Global Studies, 2019).

Jumba, a B2B construction technology platform launched in April 2022 and co-founded by UC Berkeley alum and Scholar ('15, City and Regional Planning) Kagure Wamunyu (CEO) and Miano Njoka (CTO) receives $1 million in pre-seed-funding.

Vivian Omondi, a Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program recipient in the Master of Information Management and Systems program and part of the graduating class of 2022 shares her story that got her to the stage.