Young African
Leaders Initiative
The Mandela Washington Fellowship
The Young African Leaders Initaitive (YALI) was created by the U.S. Department of State in 2010 to support young Africans as they spur economic growth and prosperity, strengthen democratic governance, and enhance peace and security across Africa. Since 2014, Mandela Washington Fellows from across Sub-Saharan Africa have developed their leadership skills and foster connections and collaboration with U.S. professionals.
The Fellowship empowers young African leaders through academic coursework, leadership training, mentoring, networking, professional opportunities, and support for activities in their communities. Fellows are young leaders from Sub-Saharan Africa who have a proven record of accomplishment in promoting innovation and positive change in their organizations, institutions, or communities.
A partner with the Department of State’s Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs and its implementing partner, IREX since the inception, Dartmouth hosted a cohort of Fellows in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018. In collaboration with partners across campus, including Thayer, Tuck, and the Rockefeller Center, we designed academic programs that challenged, inspired, and empowered these young leaders from Africa.
Many of our YALI alumni have subsequently returned to Dartmouth, like Patrice Juah of the 2014 cohort, who engaged with students to discuss her work in Liberia in the aftermath of the Ebola outbreak.
2022 Mandela Washington Fellowship Alumni Enrichment Institute
The Alumni Enrichment Institutes were a follow-on opportunity of the Mandela Washington Fellowship
The two-week Alumni Enrichment Institutes leveraged experiential and discussion-based learning to provide participants with broadly applicable knowledge about U.S. culture and society and immersed them in a U.S. community through community service, cultural exchange, strategic networking, and site visits. Participants engaged in programming on topics such as the United States’ diverse culture and society, resiliency and ethics in leadership, and social justice principles.
Read Bill Platt’s story for Dartmouth News about the 2022 enrichment institute here, and Chris Johnson and Julia Levine ’23’s photo essay here.
Explore the Dartmouth YALI Alumni Network
Reciprocal Exchange Visits
True to the nature of the YALI spirit, Dartmouth faculty and staff have stayed connected with YALI alumni. Several have made reciprocal exchange visits to collaborate on projects in Africa. In 2024, Global Health and Development Senior Associate Director Dawn Carey’s visited Ghana to work with YALI alumna Alice Aryeetey on her efforts to develop reproductive health communication tools for deaf women in Ghana.
Dartmouth in Africa
In late 2025, we collaborated with the Provost’s Office at Dartmouth to convene alumni of the Dartmouth YALI program in Nairobi for a Summit on Health, Innovation, and Diplomacy. The goal of this pilot project was to connect Dartmouth faculty and staff with YALI alumni, peers, partners, and notable African stakeholders. Learn more here.