Youth leaders

Ayesha Siddika

@Ayeshasiddika__

Ayesha is a 27-year-old GPE youth leader from Bangladesh. As a Fellow at Teach For Bangladesh, she supports and leads community-service projects focused on addressing life challenges. Ayesha also co-leads Uttoron to build momentum to end gender-based violence (GBV) among adolescents. Ayesha roots for an education system that promotes equal access to learning, nurtures students' full potential, and is capable of facilitating every child becoming a lifelong learner.

Amani Espérance

@EAmani257

Amani is a 29-year-old GPE youth leader from Burundi. She is a young multi-talented dancer, singer, motivational speaker, and spoken-word artist. As a former English teacher at Burundi Friends international, she has empowered 20,000 people by improving literacy. She believes that education is the key to sustainable development, and she dreams of seeing all children receive a quality education and hopes that every woman can be sustainably financially independent.

Sovanvotey Hok

@sovanvoteyhok

Sovanvotey Hok is a 27-year-old GPE youth leader and Cambodian menstrual health and climate activist. She is the founder of Green Lady Cambodia which runs a Menstrual Health Classroom and  awareness program. Through these activities, she introduces conversations around SRHR, CSE, and harmful gender norms in schools. She believes in improving quality life skills in an unconventional way, as it is the key to regeneration and a better future for us all.

Content related to Sovanvotey's work

• Video:
  • Education and Skills-building for a Sustainable Future

Ngimou Victorine Nchokuno

@ngimou

Ngimou Victorine Nchokuno, is a 23-year-old youth leader from Cameroon. She is a fierce feminist activist with over eight years of experience. She is passionate about fighting for girls' rights and a hygienic environment for young women and girls in and out of schools. She founded a school club called Development Fighters, coached by Women for a Change, Cameroon in 2014. She is part of many movements, such as Nala Feminist Collective. She loves sports as a means to promote quality education.

Ayesha Khan

Ayesha Khan is a 20-year-old gender and health equality advocate and researcher. She is a Global Health student at the University of Toronto. She works with various non-profit organizations to build a world in which women and girls' full potential is unlocked.  She has led a storytelling program with a female mentorship program called Girlz, FTW. It provides a platform for women and girls from over 15 countries to creatively share their experiences with gender inequality.

Dhieu Mayom Deng

@GoodnewsDhieu

Dhieu Mayom Deng is a 27-year-old GPE Youth Leader based in Canada. He actively advocates for refugee and girls' education. He co-founded a student-led community-based organization, the Dongriin Foundation, that brings together university students to execute mentorship programs and foster a love for education among refugee communities in Uganda. He believes that educating children and youth from low-income countries would create an economic balance in the world and eradicate poverty.

Nagin Ravand

@naginravand

Nagin Ravand is a 23-year-old GPE youth leader from Denmark. She is a Danish-Afghan football coach and director who fled to Denmark from Afghanistan at the age of three. She has created and directed several girls' and women's football departments in the rural areas of Denmark. She fights discrimination in sports through her organization, Globall, which educates female football ambassadors from minority communities.

Neha Ullah

Neha is a 23-year-old GPE youth leader from Denmark. She is passionate about working towards giving every child, specifically girls, the right to STEM education. She is the founder of the Nordic Women in STEM, where she teaches 400+ girls coding in the Copenhagen region. She is an advisory board member for the Girls Guiding and Scouting organization in Denmark.

Omar Alkadamani

@omar_alkadamani

Omar is an 18-year-old GPE youth leader based in Germany. He is active in his city's Youth Parliament and serves as a Youth Advisor for the German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). He also volunteers with YoupaN, a network for development in education, BrandNewBundestag, and other political and cultural programs. His motivation is his own story. As a Syrian young immigrant in Germany, he has many experiences about integration and being new in education systems.

Jess Mukeba

Jess Mukeba is a 20-year-old GPE Youth Leader studying political science and philosophy in Germany. He is a spokesperson for the Youth Council for the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and a youth advisor for The Children's Governance Project. He is passionate about equal opportunities, youth participation, education, and feminist development policy. He is currently a freelance actor and also works for the Schwarzkopf Foundation Young Europe.

Alisha Qamar

Alisha is a 22-year-old GPE youth leader based in Germany. She is a firm believer that education is the key to making autonomous choices and living an independent life. Having Pakistani roots, she witnessed differences between the German and Pakistani education systems at a very early age, which led to her becoming a strong advocate for girls' education. She has been a human rights advocate for over 10 years.

Asimawu Tahiru

@AsimawuTahiru

Asimawu is a 24-year-old GPE youth leader. She has in-depth knowledge and work experience in youth development and SRHR. She is also keen on social entrepreneurship and established Asmi Ultimate Care, an initiative that focuses on training individuals to produce soaps and detergents. She is a CAMFED's scholar.  Asimawu is also a member of the CAMFED Association (CAMA), where she passes on learning and expertise to girls and young women in her community.

Content related to Asimawu's work

• Blogs:
  • A to-do list from youth for world leaders: Transform Education
  • The power of partnering with youth to transform education
• Videos:
  • AMPLIFY Girls' Global Symposium on Adolescent Girls' Agency
  • AMPLIFY Girls-led virtual event- Girls’ Agency: In Their Own Words
• Events:
  • ECOSOC Youth Forum SDG 4 breakout session: Youth engagement in transforming education
  • Break the bias for girls in ICT and STEM

María José Carranza Padilla

Maria José is a 28-year-old GPE youth leader from Guatemala, where she advocates for guaranteed human rights for people with disabilities. She is also part of the UNDP youth advisory group in Guatemala. She is a core supporter of Miss Wheelchair Guatemala. Maria José firmly believes that sport is a tool to create a better world. She likes to describe herself as an unstoppable dreamer and education fighter.

Amara Thaecy Perdomo Aguilar

@amaraaguilar1

Amara Aguilar is a 22-year-old GPE youth leader from Honduras. She is an activist for women's rights and people with disabilities in her country with Foro Dakar Honduras and FENAPAPEDISH. She is the co-founder of an NGO with women with disabilities and their families called Colectiva Mariposa 88 HN. She is very passionate about education because, while growing up, she realized that education is not accessible to all.

Mizuki Nagasawa

@mizuki0412N

Mizuki is a 27-year-old GPE youth leader from Japan. He approaches education from the fields of business and academia. He is the founder and CEO of Fust Inc, a company that provides EdTech services. He is a visiting professor at the University of Tokyo. He studied how Edtech will impact the future of education, which has strengthened his belief in the importance of seeking solutions to the challenges faced in ensuring global education for all young people.

Jun Ogawa

Jun Ogawa is a 22-year-old GPE youth leader from Japan. He has witnessed the education gap and is eager to work on rectifying it. As the president of International Week Tokyo at his university, he  launched a startup called Join in Estonia in September 2021, which offers an app that suggests the best process for young students to achieve their academic goals.

Marina Takahashi

Marina is a 28-year-old GPE youth leader from Japan. She is an education activist with Japanese, Filipino, and Chinese roots. She realized the power of education through her experience growing up as a minority in Japan. She was also a youth delegate to the UN High-Level Political Forum as a Japan Youth Platform for Sustainability member to promote youth participation.

Valentine Mugun Chepkoech

@KenyaNiMimi035

Valentine Chepkoech is a 26-year-old GPE youth leader from Kenya. She is passionate about transformative leadership, accountability, and governance. In 2017, she spearheaded Thebarrierbreakers,  a mentorship organization that has been to over thirty schools in Kericho County, offering practical mentorship to students and distributing sanitary pads. After the COVID-19 pandemic, she narrowed her focus to The Second Chances Initiative which helps teenage mothers go back to school.

Eliza Chikoti

Eliza Chikoti is a 26-year-old GPE youth leader from rural Malawi. She is an education activist and philanthropist who promotes girls' education. She gives back to her community by supporting other vulnerable school-going children through mentoring, career guidance, motivational sessions, and SRHR sessions. She works with CAMFED and she believes that girls' education is the key to development.

Francine Niyomuhoza

Francine Niyomuhoza is a 21-year-old GPE Youth Leader originally from Rwanda who  lives in a refugee camp in Malawi. She has worked as a community social worker for  JRS on the Naweza Project. Growing up as a refugee, she knows that the only way of succeeding is by getting educated. She believes that education allows refugees and young people to attain knowledge and skills that can be used in different aspects of their lives.

Nir Shrestha

@nirshrestha2071

Nir Shrestha is a 23-year-old GPE Youth Leader from Nepal who is an inclusive development enthusiast and a youth with disability rights campaigner. He has actively been advocating for disability rights, particularly inclusive and quality education for children with disabilities, and has worked as a consultant on several inclusive education projects. He believes change is possible when we amplify the voices of children and young people with disabilities at the global level.

Content related to Nir's work

• Policy brief:
  • Leveraging the Power of Youth to promote Inclusive Education for Children with disabilities

Lalita Tamang

Lalita Tamang is a 19-year-old GPE Youth Leader from Nepal. She is a Girls Not Brides  youth leader.  Since childhood, she has been involved in extracurricular activities in her school, organizing programs and campaigns on leadership, education, environment, safety, self-defense, SRHR, and many other issues through the Tri Padma Child Club. She works with Civil societies and the government to include girls' issues in policy making.

Gabriella Akyea

Gabriella Akyea is a 21-year-old GPE Youth Leader of Ghanaian decent, currently studying a bachelor's degree in communications in the Netherlands.

She is a spokesperson for Open Up, where she organizes programs about internship discrimination, providing platforms for student interns to engage with the very companies that could help stop discrimination. She is also a member of the Faculty of Digital Media and Creative Industries (FDMCI) district council at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS), the communication group and young district council branch, where she gets the chance to discuss policy within her school faculty.

Since childhood, Gabriella has witnessed how students could not attend school due to learning challenges and financial constraints. This inspired her interest in advocating for access to education. As a GPE Youth Leader, Gabriella aims to help to create awareness about education because "every young person has the full right to learn despite their language, income, or origin", she says.

Kevin Eustatia-Palm

@Kev_Palm

Kevin Eustatia-Palm is a 22-year-old youth engagement expert from The Netherlands. He has spent his entire career working with governments, NGOs, and companies to help them incorporate meaningful youth participation into their policies.

Kevin was born and raised on the small Caribbean Island of Curaçao, where he saw first-hand how some students were systematically being left behind. This made him realize that we simply cannot fight for quality education without explicitly focusing on marginalized groups within our communities.

He is a member of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Youth Advisory Committee, where he spends his time focusing on education on a policy level. He now brings this valuable experience into the field of advocacy. Throughout the years, he has worked with countless organizations to help make the world a better place. In his new role as a GPE Youth Leader, he is extremely happy to continue with his passion for making the world a better place, one step at a time.

Rosalie Schoemaker

Rosalie is a 23-year-old GPE Youth Leader from The Netherlands. She is a student who strives to become a learning expert with a comprehensive understanding of education systems worldwide. After obtaining a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Educational Sciences with a minor in International Perspectives on Youth and Education, she is currently enrolled in an International Development Studies program. Next to academics, she has gained practical experience through working in primary and secondary schools, and through volunteering with children from a migrant background. Rosalie is interested in governance and has applied the knowledge she has gained during her internship at the Dutch Education Council. She has taken the first steps to advocate for inclusive school environments as a member of the Dutch UNESCO Youth committee, where she has initiated a campaign to provide free menstrual products in educational institutions across the country.

Rosalie believes that education is crucial for individuals, communities and regions to flourish and she dreams of a world where everyone has access to quality education. Rosalie is determined to make a valuable contribution to realizing this for many children. As a Youth Leader for the Netherlands, she is motivated to discover ways to use her voice and amplify those of others, in order to collectively raise awareness about the importance of education up to the highest levels of decision-making.

Motunrayo Fatoke

@motunbee_

Motunrayo is a 24-year-old GPE youth leader championing access to quality education in marginalized communities in Nigeria. She currently works with TEP Centre. She designs projects focused on improving access to STEM education for girls and young women in Nigeria and co-plans the Education Innovation Summit (NEDIS), which has a core focus on bridging skill gaps to improve innovation in Africa.

Temilade Salami

@theglobaltemi

Temilade Salami is a 25-year-old GPE youth leader from Nigeria. She is the founder and executive director of EcoWarriors. She has spent the past five years leading a group of over 200 young environmentalists across 26 African countries. She has authored two environmental books to bridge the climate education gap in Africa. She also launched the Climate Education Leaders Fellowship in Africa. She is a member of the UNESCO SDG4Youth network.

Content related to Temilade's work

• Videos:
  • A day in the life at the World Bank and IMF Spring Meetings with climate activist, Temilade, and World Bank Senior Climate Change Advisor Stéphane Hallegatte
  • GPE Youth Leader, Temilade, talks about harnessing the power of education for climate action with CEO Laura Frigenti

Anzal Abbas

@Sanzalabbas

Anzal Abbas is a 24-year-old GPE Youth Leader, from Pakistan. He works in the education and public health sectors as an advocate for youth empowerment. He is a member of known national youth advocacy platforms in Pakistan. He is the founder of Bagh-e-Sakina. He is also a content creator dedicated to improving people's awareness of social issues through @anzalabbas.

Alice Mukashyaka

@alicem2016

Alice Mukashyaka is a 28-year-old GPE youth leader from Rwanda. She led the UN Foundation's mobilization for the Transforming Education Summit (TES) in 2022. She is the co-founder of Starlight, a Rwandan Social enterprise. She is currently supporting the office of the African Union Youth Envoy to elaborate plans of action to achieve the Africa we want.

Content related to Alice's work

• Videos:
  • Big Brainstorm Spotlight Session on equipping young people with the skills to thrive
  • Education and Skills-building for a Sustainable Future

Billan Ahmed

@billan_ahmed

Billan Ahmed is a 26-year-old GPE youth leader from Somalia and Ethiopia. Billan is passionate about creating lifelong solutions for youth and women and also promotes climate actions through education. As part of her education campaigns, she creates climate change awareness and promotes grassroots climate actions at the community level. Billan has designed and led the implementation of  UPSHIFT, a social entrepreneurship program designed to build green skills and opportunities for young people in Somalia.

Seme Luate Cons Lomoro

Seme Luate Cons Lomoro is a 22-year-old GPE Youth Leader based in Uganda Bidibidi Refugee. He is enrolled in Bidibidi in the projects of I CAN South Sudan, a youth- and refugee-led organization. He recently led a project called "Disability is not a Burden," which aims to assess, and enroll refugee children with disabilities in school, train teachers and parents, and provide assistive learning devices to children with disabilities.

Salha Aziz

@salhabintiaziz

Salha Aziz is a 28-year-old GPE youth leader from Tanzania. She is the founder and executive director of Binti Salha Foundation. She is an SDG champion and advocates for adolescent girls' and young women's rights to quality education, economic freedom, and good health. She is an AU-CIEFFA Ambassador for Girls' Right to Education. She believes that when a young girl is empowered and educated, a community is also empowered.

Oussema Sahnoun

Oussema Sahnoun is a 25-year-old GPE Youth Leader from Tunisia. He is an active member of the National Association for the Right to Education for All, a member of the Tunisian Educational Coalition, and a member of the Educational Youth Academy of the Arab Campaign for Education for All. His interest in education is focused on climate education and equitable access to education for refugees.

Hilda Flavia Nakabuye

@NakabuyeHildaF

Hilda Flavia Nakabuye is a GPE youth leader, a climate and environmental rights activist, and the founder of the Fridays For Future Uganda movement. She is a Girl Rising Fellow and a recipient of the Women Have Wings Human Rights Award. She advocates for greater gender equality. One of her environmental concerns is saving Lake Victoria. she sensitizes her community on climate education and empowers more women to join the fight against climate change.

Content related to Hilda's work

• Video:
  • Speech at the closing plenary of the UN Water Summit in New York

Oleksii Druz

Oleksii is a 27-year-old Ukrainian GPE youth leader living in Romania. He was forced to flee to Romania as a result of the war in Ukraine. He now works with the National Youth Foundation (FNT) in Romania. He serves as a youth project coordinator to identify Ukrainian youth in local communities and design and deliver projects that meet their needs and priorities with a main focus on education.

Zubair Junjunia

Zubair is a GPE Youth Leader based in the UK and the founder of ZNotes. He is a recipient of the Diana Legacy Award, an advisory board member of DEFI at Cambridge University and the EY Foundation, as well as a  One Young World Ambassador and  an SDG advocate. He has spoken internationally, including at the 74th UN General Assembly and TEDx.

Content related to Zubair's work

• Blog:
  • The growing importance of technology to make education truly equitable

Michelle Kafe

Michelle is a GPE youth leader based in the UK. She serves as a donor youth leader for GPE, where she is dedicated to advocating for the transformation of education systems in lower-income countries. She is especially focused on reaching and empowering young girls through equitable access to education. Michelle is also currently a youth ambassador at ONE.

Vee (Varaidzo) Kativhu

@veekativhu

Vee (Varaidzo) Kativhu is a GPE Youth Leader from the United Kingdom. She is a 24-year-old YouTuber and girls' education activist. She provides academic empowerment skills to students through her non-profit organization, Empowered By Vee. She is a Diana Award Legacy Award recipient. She is also a UN Youth Envoy SDGs Young Leader. She is currently an active ambassador for United World Schools, CAMFED, and GirlUp Zimbabwe.

Content related to Vee's work

• Videos:
  • Education and Skills-building for a Sustainable Future
  • Meet the GPE Youth Leaders at the ECOSOC Youth Forum

Heela Yoon

@yoonheela1

Heela Yoon is a 24-year-old peace and education activist based in the UK. She is the founder of Afghan Youth Ambassadors for Peace , She has worked with Global Network of Women Peacebuilders  as a Cora Weiss peacebuilding fellow. She is also a member of the United Network of Young Peacebuilders (UNOY) and the Network for Religious and Traditional Peacemakers. The office of the UN Youth Envoy recently recognized her as one of the Young Leaders for SDGs 4 and 9.

Content related to Heela's work

• Video:
  • Meet the GPE Youth Leaders at the ECOSOC Youth Forum

Tendai Kunyelesa

@Tkunyelesa

Tendai Kunyelesa is a 22-year-old GPE youth leader from Zimbabwe. She is a dynamic young leader who is passionate about advancing the leadership of girls and young women in SRHR, HIV prevention, gender equality, and education. She is the co-founder of the Development Agenda for Girls and Women in Africa Network. Tendai is also part of Generation Unlimited's Young People's Action Team (YPAT).