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Gorata was born and raised in Botswana, and she graduated from Columbia University with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics. Her passion lies in leveraging data to maximize the effectiveness of development interventions in African communities. At Columbia, she served as an executive board member of the African Development Group, which aimed to foster diaspora involvement in African growth and development. She organized speaker events to facilitate dialogue on pressing issues facing the continent.

After graduating from Columbia University, Gorata returned to Botswana and started her career as a Project Support Officer for the European Union project to Support Job Creation and Investment Climate (JCIC) at the Botswana Ministry of Trade and Industry. This role was a transformative experience, exposing her to the intricacies of investment policy and public sector management, and introducing her to the field of Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E).

Fueled by her interest in M&E, Gorata transitioned to M&E Research Assistant at Sunshine Cinema, where she gained a deeper appreciation for the role of grassroots movements in effecting change through social and policy advocacy. She further developed her interest in impact measurement by working with the impact lead on outcome harvesting for the organization’s flagship impact case study.

Gorata’s passion for M&E and data-driven initiatives continued through her role as a Research Officer at Youth Impact. Here, she gained exposure to impact evaluations, randomized studies, and interventions improving health and education outcomes. Her responsibilities included conducting field visits, programming surveys in SurveyCTO, and data cleaning and analysis to support monitoring and evaluation of the Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) program.

Gorata appreciates opportunities for cross-cultural learning and she is excited to join the Princeton in Africa community as a Project Impact Coordinator at Farming Out of Poverty. In her spare time, she enjoys solving jigsaw puzzles and cryptic crosswords.

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Lyla Renwick-Archibold is a recent graduate from Washington University in St. Louis with a degree in computer science and brain sciences. Through her experiences studying human rights and technology in Amsterdam and interning at a startup in Cape Town, Lyla developed an interest in the misuse of technology and how they affect society. She has continued to pursue this interest by spearheading a research project at the McKelvey School of Engineering about the toxicity of AI chatbots. She is interested in pursuing a law degree and working on developing global regulation to lead to equitable technology development and usage, and is excited to be a fellow working on STEM education in Tanzania.

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Sarra Hussien graduated from the University of Southern California with a degree in Political Science and a minor in Psychology from the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences in Spring 2024. At USC, she served as the President of Glimpse from the Globe, a foreign affairs publication on campus. She was also the Assistant Director of Advocacy for the Middle Eastern and North African Student Assembly, served on the Executive Board for the East African Student Association, and Director of PBL Programming for the Global Policy Institute, in addition to other leadership positions she held in other student organizations. She was an undergraduate researcher for the Near Crisis Project, where she analyzed the escalation processes of crises in Africa. Sarra also served as an on-call Amharic translator at Al Otro Lado, a local immigration firm. This past summer, she worked for the Africa Office of the Bureau of Refugees and Migration at the Department of State and contributed to the formulation of federal-level refugee policy, gaining more insight on the socio-political history of Africa and how countries like Kenya and Tanzania are addressing the refugee crises. Previously, she spent three months in Amman, Jordan working for the Jordan Health Aid Society, a non-governmental organization that provides health and psychosocial support services in Zaatari Refugee Camp. She also took courses on humanitarian action and refugee crisis response at the School of International Training in Amman, Jordan. Originally from Texas, Sarra enjoys spending time with friends and family, traveling, and learning languages.

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Originally from Maryland, Delana graduated cum laude from the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, earning a degree in American Studies, a minor in Politics, and a certificate in Civic and Global Leadership. While at Sewanee, she completed over 1,000 service hours as a Bonner Leader, primarily focusing on establishing a trail recognizing the university’s historically Black community through the Roberson Project on Slavery, Race, and Reconciliation. She also served as a philanthropy intern for the South Cumberland Community Fund, managing a $30,000 grant distribution to local community organizations. Outside of Sewanee, Delana studied abroad in Ghana, exploring globalization and the legacies of enslavement. Later, she earned a Biehl International Research Fellowship to return to Ghana for an independent research project in Nima, Accra. Additionally, she led outreach trips to Selma, Alabama, collaborating with university students to engage with civil rights foot soldiers and community organizers. Following the Princeton in Africa Fellowship, Delana plans to pursue a master’s degree for a career in foreign service. She enjoys rollerskating, bowling, and watching investigative documentaries.

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Beata Corcoran recently completed a Labouisse Fellowship assisting particularly vulnerable asylum seekers from Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia, including survivors of torture and human trafficking through the Caritas Cyprus Migrant Center (Nicosia, Cyprus). She is passionate about the delivery of ethical, life-affirming and community-informed health care delivery in low-resourced settings. She has experience in grant assessment and allocation as well as database management, project monitoring and implementation research from internships at USAID’s Center for Innovation and Impact and UNICEF’s Health System’s Strengthening Unit (Washington, DC). Beata was first exposed to community-led, trauma-informed support while working with Philani’s community health workers, who use a mobile clinic to treat malnourished infants and new mothers in Khayelitsha Township (Cape Town, South Africa). Beata has documented the work of numerous NGOs through visual and written storytelling for donor relations, including in Jakarta, Indonesia and in Tofo, Mozambique. Beata Corcoran graduated from Princeton University with a degree in Medical Anthropology, and certificates in Global Health & Health Policy and African Studies. Her academic research focused on structural violence and climate migration. As a student, Beata dedicated herself to humanitarian causes, volunteering with a campus organization aiding survivors of intimate violence and leading workshops on healthy relationships. Growing up in Washington, DC, Beata’s main interest lies in developing creative, effective solutions to bridging linguistic and cultural barriers. She considers herself a lifelong learner, and continually works to understand new communities and contexts. She plans to pursue graduate studies in humanitarian approaches to armed conflict and forced migration, laying the foundation for a career in global health crisis response or migration policy.

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Amma-Sika Adomako is a dedicated young professional committed to advancing organizational development and strengthening the human capital of African organizations. She holds a Master’s in Public Policy from American University with a concentration in global agricultural and food systems development. As well as a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and certificate in Economics from Temple University. At Temple University, Amma-Sika received the Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship to study political science at Sciences Po Lyon. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal from 2019 to 2020 as a Business Advisor offering business training to individuals and organizations within the agriculture industry. Amma-Sika’s transformative time in the Peace Corps allowed her aspirations to become clear. After completing the fellowship, Amma-Sika intends to come back to the Continent to initiate a social agribusiness venture. This enterprise will concentrate on revolutionizing supply value chains for cosmetic products derived from indigenous African produce, employing education, technology, and sustainable practices. Outside of school and work, Amma-Sika enjoys spending quality time with family and friends. She also enjoys the outdoors, food, and films.

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Jackie Namala is from The Bronx, New York. She graduated from Princeton University, where she studied Public and International Affairs and Spanish. Having grown up in working class households in Uganda and the US, Jackie has always been curious about how individuals can be empowered to secure better livelihoods for themselves. She is primarily interested in the role education plays in both individual mobility and national development and envisions herself working as an international educational consultant. Her dream is to make quality education accessible to all. As an undergraduate student at Princeton, she joyfully took advantage of the liberal arts education; in her independent work, she focused on Africa, studying the relationships between racial discrimination and adolescent mental health in South Africa (vis-à-vis the US), socio-economic status and sub-Saharan women’s political participation and, for her senior thesis, universal primary education and intergenerational education mobility in Uganda. Furthermore, Jackie virtually volunteered as a K-12 tutor and an outreach associate with Hatch Tutors, an educational non-profit, and worked as a Peer Academic Advisor on campus. She feels very honored and excited to work with the students and educators at Rwamagana Leaders’ School. In her leisure time, Jackie loves to cook, sing and learn new languages. She also has newfound interests in travel and physical exercise, particularly running.

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Senam is a Ghanaian Rwandan American who is passionate about sustainable development. The inextricable link between public health, climate change, and human rights has guided her academic and career pursuits. Senam brings a global perspective shaped by her culture, commitment to social justice, and community leadership. She aims to use data science to advance health equity and sustainable development.

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Merete Cowles graduated from the University of Vermont with degrees in Health & Society, Anthropology, and a certificate in Global Health. While at UVM, she was awarded the George Henry Perkins Award and the Outstanding Senior Award for her academic and extracurricular achievements. With a special interest in displacement and crisis response, Merete spent a semester studying refugee health in Amman where she interned at the Institute for Family Health, leading projects on disability rehabilitation and psychosocial support for refugee survivors of gender-based violence and torture. Upon her return, she interned with the Humanitarian Affairs team at CARE where she mobilized resources for numerous successful USAID and private grants ranging from $55k to $5M. After graduating, Merete joined the Refugee Women’s Centre to deliver emergency aid to the displaced populations navigating France’s Northern coast. While providing mobile material, medical, and psychosocial support, she also developed and implemented innovative internal communications strategies to improve staff access to safeguarding, service referral, and capacity-building resources. She continues to use her strategic design and storytelling skills to celebrate the resilience of conflict-affected women and amplify their voices to global audiences while consulting at impactful organizations such as the Batonga Foundation and the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders. Driven to create a positive impact while expanding her comfort zone, Merete loves to travel cheap, hike often, make art, and connect with friends both old and new.

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Eugenia recently graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as a Morehead-Cain Scholar with degrees in public policy and interdisciplinary studies. Originally from Hong Kong, she has adopted a global perspective on addressing social inequities. Throughout her undergraduate experience, her interests in sustainable food systems and global development have led her to research Doughnut Economics in Amsterdam, community currencies in Costa Rica, and rights of nature laws in Ecuador. To culminate these experiences, she developed and taught a 16-week honors seminar course in the spring of her senior year, exploring alternative economic models centered on social and ecological well-being. She was also named a finalist in the Oxford Skoll Centre’s global systems mapping competition, where her team analyzed the root causes of unequal food access in Washington, DC. Through these experiences, she hopes to develop a cross-cultural approach to mitigating climate change while uplifting impoverished communities through redefining social progress. She has written extensively about these topics on her blog, where she shares bite-sized environmental education and has spoken on various global panels on climate justice and youth empowerment, reaching 10,000 people. Beyond academics, she worked as a barista and sustainability associate at UNC’s only student-run nonprofit coffee shop and enjoys playing ultimate frisbee. She recently represented Hong Kong in the Under-24 World Championships and served as the president of UNC’s four-time national championship-winning team.