Alumni Directory Display

Hilary recently finished her Master’s Degree at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where she studied International Development. She spent the first year of her MA on the SAIS campus in Bologna, Italy, and then worked in Paris last summer as a consultant for the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. Interested in global health, Hilary was an Emergency Health and Nutrition intern for Save the Children in DC this past fall, and looks forward to gaining more experience with PSI in Nairobi next year. Hilary also received her BA from Johns Hopkins, where she pursued a double major in International Studies and Spanish, and a minor in Entrepreneurship & Management. She loves traveling, biking, and running, and is hoping to explore East Africa and learn Swahili while in Kenya.

Alumni Update:

Ruby is currently the Internship Coordinator at Generations Ahead, an organization that empowers young parents, in Traverse City, Michigan.

Fellow Bio:

Ruby graduated from the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan in 2017, focusing in African Development and Policy. At the University of Michigan, Ruby was the co-president of the Roosevelt Institute, a student-run policy think tank. Through Roosevelt, she led an initiative to increase the university’s procurement from local women- and minority-owned businesses and published a policy on reforming regulations for Michigan charter schools in the national 10 Ideas Journal. She was also president of the Advisory Council for the Global Scholars Program (GSP), a living community focused on global social justice. Ruby has interned with the Niger Delta Partnership Initiative in Washington, D.C., the Department of State at the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania, and local political campaigns in her hometown of Traverse City, Michigan. While working at the Embassy, Ruby loved traveling to speak with students about higher education and testing out her Swahili on her very patient co-workers. She is extremely excited to return to Tanzania and work with IEFT. Ruby loves reading by the lake (any lake), her dog, Rosie, and hosting game nights with friends.

Alumni Update:

Ryan currently works as a Program Officer with FHI 360.

Fellow Bio:

Ryan is from Holland, Pennsylvania and graduated with a degree in Anthropology. Interested in the intersections between public health, culture and food, Ryan conducted senior thesis research on neighborhood food access in Baltimore city and worked for a year as a research assistant at the Center for a Livable Future. At Hopkins, he participated in the Baltimore Collegetown Leadershape Program and organized food justice volunteer initiatives through the Center for Social Concern. Abroad, Ryan interned for a summer with the Johns Hopkins Center for Global Health and Population Services International in Kigali, Rwanda, spent a semester studying abroad across Kenya, and pursued an independent study of the street food industry in Kisumu, Kenya. Ryan looks forward to picking up some Wolof, traveling through West Africa and exploring Senegalese culture this upcoming year.

While originally from the Netherlands, Liselot spent majority of her life living in different cities across America and now calls Baton Rouge, Louisiana, home. She graduated in May 2016 from Georgetown University, where she majored in International Health. While at Georgetown, she was a volunteer and community outreach intern for DC SCORES, a health-policy research intern at the Population Reference Bureau (PRB), and a volunteer in the DC community as a tutor and teaching assistant. During her senior fall semester, Liselot was a researcher at the National Institute of Medical Research in Dar es Salaam, completing her senior thesis on anemia and its risk factors in children under the age of two in rural Tanzania. Throughout college, Liselot was also a member of the varsity tennis team. When not playing tennis, her summer experiences included being an ambassador and a high school teacher in Zanzibar for America’s Unofficial Ambassadors, a fitness fundraising intern at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, and a neurology nursing assistant at a hospital in Amsterdam. She is looking forward to discovering a new part of Africa, continuing to work in the public health sphere, meeting new people, and hopefully using her fluency in Dutch to learn some Afrikaans.

Alumni Update:

Julie is continuing to work as a Staff Attorney at the International Refugee Assistance Project where she represents forced migrants in the legal processes to safety.

Fellow Bio:

Julie (Northwestern ‘11) is from West Bloomfield, Michigan and studied Social Policy, Political Science and Global Health in college. During her time at Northwestern, she co-directed the Northwestern University Conference on Human Rights, the largest-undergraduate student-run, student-attended conference on human rights in the country. She wrote her honor’s thesis on the effects of overseas cultural orientation programs on refugees’ perceptions of America and studied the traditional and modern health fields in Kampala, Uganda. Julie has worked for both Heartland Alliance and Refugee One doing advocacy and resettlement work with refugees. Julie is thrilled to be returning to Uganda next year to work with the Lutheran World Federation. She is excited to eat matooke, practice her Ugandan dance moves and meet inspiring people.

Fellow Bio:

Emily (Wesleyan ‘11) is from Princeton, NJ. She majored in Psychology and French Studies and received the Writing Certificate. At Wesleyan, Emily was a member of the club ski team, the Ebony Singers gospel choir, and she led a community service group that taught elementary school children about disabilities through puppet theater. While in Botswana next year, Emily looks forward to learning more about pediatric HIV/AIDS care before she heads off to medical school.

Malika Kounkourou graduated from Boston University (BU) with a degree in International Relations concentrating on Environment and Development in Africa and the Middle East. She completed her senior honors thesis on rethinking sustainable environmental peacebuilding through a case study of uranium mining governance in Niger. Her research highlights necessary contextual factors to consider for the sustainability of a prospective environmental peacebuilding process with the aim of targeting root causes of development and security issues facing indigenous populations and fostering sustainable livelihoods. As a proud daughter of Nigerien immigrants, Malika is passionate about preserving her heritage through her cultural revival brand, Tchidite. Beyond a business, her brand is geared towards reclaiming Tuareg culture through an educational platform as well as combating unemployment by collaborating with Tuareg artisans. Working with Ihsan Foundation and FIPSO Niger, she fundraises, budgets, and manages projects providing humanitarian relief to vulnerable populations facing public health crises. She strives to work with NGOs, IGOs, and governments to find long-term research-based solutions targeting development issues on an institutional level. Driven by her aspiration to advance sustainable development on the African continent, Malika is honored to join Population Services International as a Regional Health Fellow and contribute to the data-driven work they do to shape markets and shift policy to better support consumer empowered healthcare.

A native of Zambia, Nduulwa has been driven by her curiosity to discover innovative solutions to some of the most pressing issues we face. Over the last five years, she has worked to push projects and marketing campaigns forward at a number of nonprofits and startups. Previously, she worked as a marketing and program management consultant for the UMKC Innovation Center’s Technology Venture Studio. As a consultant, she evaluated potential program participants and implemented the studio’s marketing and communications strategy. Nduulwa was also a part of the founding team at WeJapa, a startup connecting companies to tech talent in Africa. She served as chief marketing officer and led the company’s inbound and outbound marketing strategy, resulting in the on boarding of fifteen hiring partners across Africa and Europe. At the Women’s Fund of Omaha, she worked to implement innovative marketing strategies for the fund’s Adolescent Health Project. While at the fund, she managed a social media influencer program, the 2019 summer internship program, and served as project manager and liaison for I Be Black Girl, an initiative that funds grassroots organizations led by Black women and girls. After earning her MBA in 2019, she began to wonder what role business and entrepreneurship can play in Africa’s growth and development and went on to launch Dear Diaspora, a podcast spotlighting African entrepreneurs transforming Africa’s challenges into business opportunities. Recognizing the public sector’s role in creating an enabling environment for business and beyond, she looks forward to gaining a more holistic perspective as a program fellow with Emerging Public Leaders in Ghana.

Marco Kull, who is half-Swiss and half-Croatian, graduated from Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service in 2018 with a degree in International Political Economy and a certificate in Australian, New Zealand, and Pacific Studies. Born in Switzerland, but having spent his childhood living in a number of countries, his studies at Georgetown naturally gravitated towards putting political economy in a global context, eventually focusing on using firm-level data to quantify, compare, and contrast private sector conditions and trajectories across states. During his studies, he spent time working with the Swiss mission to Cuba, as a trainee public markets Portfolio Manager at Bank Julius Baer in Geneva, and as a waiter at restaurants in Peru and Chile; after graduating, he joined UBS’ New York office as an Investment Banking Analyst, where he spent two years working on a variety of M&A and Capital Markets transactions as part of the bank’s Global Consumer Products & Retail coverage team. Fascinated by the ongoing development of private sectors across Africa and the diversity of economic, social, and political opportunity that it presents, Marco’s goal is to build a nuanced understanding of the circumstances and structures shaping that process, and start a career working in and with Africa.

Meital Kupfer graduated in 2017 from the George Washington University with a BA in International Affairs, focusing on International Development.  Meital spent a semester in Kampala, Uganda. During her time in Uganda, Meital spent two months in Kyangwali Refugee Settlement as an Education Intern for Action Africa Help – Uganda. There, she also conducted an independent case study on the structure and quality of Kyangwali’s education system. She has interned for Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro in Washington, D.C., focusing research on paid maternal leave and trade agreements for legislative assistants. She was an Advocacy and Government Relations Intern for the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI), tracking congressional legislation, writing memos, and advocating for refugee resettlement in the field of government relations. She was a  Protections Intern at the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Washington, D.C. handling asylum seekers’ cases. She was a Virtual Student Foreign Service intern for the USAID Economic Growth office in Kampala, Uganda, proofreading communications and conducting strategic stakeholder analysis on donors.  Lastly, she was an executive board member of the No Lost Generation chapter at GW, a campus initiative partnered with the State Department aimed at providing quality education for refugee youth.  In her free time, Meital enjoys hiking, reading, and going to concerts. She is looking forward to returning to Uganda as a Fellow!