Mohsin Kakar is an Operations Specialist for AseelApp, a social impact-focused tech startup aimed at supporting Afghan artisans. AseelApp collaborates with local artisans from diverse backgrounds and sells their products to international customers through their digital storefront. The startup emphasizes support for female artisans who are underserved and underrepresented as producers in the marketplace. AseelApp has offices in Afghanistan, Turkey, and the United States.

Andrea Michelle is the Productive Projects Coordinator at Grupo Restaurantera Gigante, a Mexican restaurant chain that operates five brands internationally: Toks, Panda Express, Farolito, Beer Factory, and Shake Shack. They have more than 9,000 employees and serve 30 million customers annually. The purpose of the Productive Projects branch within the group is to grow the value chain by integrating producers from vulnerable and/or indigenous communities, thereby helping them to strengthen and monitor the growth of their business models in a sustainable and responsible manner. Their end goal is to bridge the economic gap between small producers and large distributors.

Nadeen Awwad is a Co-Founder and CEO of Trainsquare, an online platform that facilitates and promotes in-person, hands-on group workshops to fuel interaction, connection, and learning while reducing social anxiety and enhancing a community’s well-being. Trainsquare is intentional about attracting low-income community members and promoting skilled individuals to connect with and empower their communities. While Trainsquare is in the early prototyping phase, they have already reached 1,000 followers on LinkedIn and their information website receives more than 250 unique visits per month.

Lilian Nakigozi is the CEO of Women Smiles Uganda, a social enterprise that provides affordable, reliable, and modern training in vertical farming concepts to women and youth. Through the programming offered by Women Smiles Uganda, participants are able to build their capacity to use available resources to sustain themselves and enhance their food security. To date, the organization has trained over 7,000 women and youth in sustainable vertical farming concepts who have then gone on to feed an additional 4,000 children through the food grown on their farms.

Jediel Mwimenyi is the Founder of Headway Agriventures Ltd., an incorporated agricultural company aiming to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal No. 2, “Zero Hunger” by offering farm management services to large, medium, and small-scale farmers in Kenya. This solution will help reclaim under-utilized lands in the country, which will result in increased agricultural productivity and sustainable food production to help counter growing food insecurity in Kenya. Headway Agriventures Ltd. is currently working on 22 unique projects, which will reach more than 200 people across Kenya.

Peter Njeri is the Co-Founder of Megagas Alternative Energy, a cleantech startup whose mission is to provide clean and affordable energy to low-income families. The primary objective of the venture is to convert unsorted plastic waste into clean gaseous fuel through a thermal cracking process of distillation and compression. The resulting fuel produces no emissions, residue, or pollution into the environment, which is then safe for use in indoor facilities. Megagas Alternative Energy currently serves 6,400 families, which results in a reduction of 26,672 kg of C02.

Daniela Hernandez is the Co-Founder and CEO of Earth & Life University, a university that aims to create a living-learning ecosystem focused on training the next generation of change-makers in environmental sustainability and personal development at a higher postgraduate level. Earth & Life University has a network of 60 teachers from 40 national and international institutions who specialize in sustainability and personal development. Since its inception in 2019, the program has provided training to 8,500 participants through events and free Masterclasses.

Sammy Mwanja is the Founder of Tumaini Hand Mission, which designs and manufactures educational materials for Montessori schools and individuals with developmental disorders. Tumaini Hand Mission focuses specifically on serving educational establishments in marginalized communities to improve literacy rates for underserved and underrepresented populations. To date, they have successfully trained more than 500 teachers and provided their learning materials to 3,000 refugee children.

Xochitl Sarahi is the Communications and Network Manager at Todo Accesible. Together with Luis Quintana, director of Todo Accesible (Mexico) and Luciano Velez, director of Poteciate (Argentina), Xochitl is leading a project called “Transforming organization with I.D.E.A.”. This project seeks to create a network of strategic partners that have long focused on expanding and developing their pillars of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility. They aim to bring talent from historically excluded populations into the labor field.

Elly Savatia is the Co-Founder and CEO of Veezaviz, an assistive technology social enterprise addressing the communication and accessibility barrier for the Deaf community. Veezaviz is committed to creating new generation innovative technologies that enable two-way communication between Deaf, hard of hearing, and hearing individuals through AI-based sign language interpretation and automated avatar sign language production technology. Elly has been recognized as an Obama Young African Leader, a We Are Family Foundation Global Teen Leader, World Bank African Drone Youth Scholar, and as Unicef Generation Unlimited’s Youth Innovation Challenge Winner.

Shanice Wainaina is the Founder and CEO of Through My Eyes Ltd., an organization that trains individuals to become professional caregivers of people with disabilities (PWD). By hosting family-centered and community-engaging forums, Through My Eyes also acts as an advocate for PWD. To date, Through My Eyes has trained twenty individuals in cerebral palsy care, ten of whom are now employed as full-time caregivers. They have also opened a caregiving center in the urban slums of Kariobangi, Kenya where they care for fifteen children with disabilities.

Carlos Calderon is the Founder and CEO of Proactible, a social enterprise that empowers people with a low-member amputation with prostheses and physical therapy. Proactible diagnoses over 100 people per year and has helped over 400 people to date with a lower limb amputation. Of these patients, over 250 individuals have been able to return to work and Proactible has supported them in over $2 million in savings on their treatment.

Mulenzi Tonny, a Deaf entrepreneur, is a Team Lead at Love 4 Immigrants, a social space for immigrant and refugee populations. The organization aims to connect immigrants to their communities as respected, loved, and heard individuals by sharing their narratives through art and storytelling. Love 4 Immigrants connect immigrants to resources and acts as a platform for artists and storytellers to create and showcase their work. Love 4 Immigrants has supported 1,000 immigrant and refugees to date.

Aral Surmeli is a medical doctor from Turkey with a Master’s Degree in Public Health. He is currently pursuing his Doctoral Degree in Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. Aral is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of HERA, a nonprofit organization that improves access to healthcare for forcibly displaced people. HERA is a web platform designed with and for refugee populations to increase the uptake of preventive health services. In the past two years, HERA has grown to serve 5,000 users in Turkey who are predominantly Afghan and Syrian refugees.

Diana Izquierdo is the Co-CEO of HolaCode. HolaCode was created in 2017 with the aim of democratizing technological training for migrants, so that they are able to access economic opportunity that they are usually denied due to their immigration status. HolaCode is the only program in Latin America that fosters social mobility via Edtech. Since its founding in 2017, HolaCode has graduated 92 students with a 90% job insertion rate. In the future they hope to facilitate two simultaneous cohorts that would graduate 100 students a year.

Frankline Ojiambo is the Founder of Franky’s Foundation, a youth-led organization that has partnered with the Ministry of ICT and Youth Affairs, Shining Hope for Communities, and the International Rescue Committee to promote economic progress and improve the lives of youth, women, and refugees in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya. Their primary goal is to solve urban unemployment through vocational skills training. To date, Franky’s Foundation has taught intensive ICT-related courses to over 400 refugees.

Annabel Angwenyi is the Co-Founder and CEO of Ziada, a tech-enabled support partner that collaborates with informal service providers in Kenya. Ziada not only matches service providers with local clients but the platform also offers valuable services including equipment rental, marketing support, and business advising. To date, they have had over 60,000 downloads with more than 32,000 registered users. They have onboarded 5,000 service providers (38% of whom are women) onto the platform and have observed over 8,000 job requests made by clients.

Laila Jewayni is the Founder of Refuge Wellness, a social enterprise that helps customers create inner and outer sanctuaries with holistic & natural products and wellness experiences. Refuge Wellness is also focused on teaching refugees how to create a sanctuary within, through free wellness community classes. Refugees are 8x more likely to have PTSD and nearly 3x more likely to have depression than the average person, yet few seek treatment from the Western mental health model. Refuge Wellness believes that holistic and alternative wellness sciences like Ayurveda and Yoga can fill this critical gap.

Ahmad Jalal Zalal is the Founder of a Developer for Developer online school that focuses on educating and advising girls in Afghanistan. The program offers online schooling as an alternative to traditional education, which is currently banned for girls and women across the majority of Afghanistan. The curriculum has a specific focus on technological training in an effort to prepare girls for employment in the technology sector. The venture also offers advisory support to help girls secure scholarships to international education institutions. Developer for Developer has trained more than 600 students online.

Yaser Yousofi is a student at Kabul University in Kabul, Afghanistan. A former English and Mathematics teacher, Yaser has first-hand experience with the pressing issue of education inequality for girls and underprivileged children in Afghanistan. In most parts of the country, education for girls has been entirely outlawed. Yaser hopes to launch a venture to provide free local and virtual education for these marginalized groups.

Maryam Monib is the Founder of Maktab, an award-winning e-Learning and collaboration platform. The platform focuses on providing Afghan youth, especially girls, and Afghan immigrants outside of the country access to quality education. Additionally, the platform features an awareness module and a social interaction functionality where users share knowledge and answer questions to provide cultural understanding to their peers. Since its founding in 2018, Maktab has served 30,000 people and has a projected audience of 2 million by 2027.

Nancy Bosnoian is the Founder of End No Sleep, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit that works to improve sleep in vulnerable communities. Research shows that poor sleep quality perpetuates income and education inequalities, thus the organization provides sleep resources to vulnerable communities through education, awareness, and direct service. End No Sleep has established chapters in Ghana, Tanzania, Armenia, Egypt, and the United States. Through mobilizing the power of their volunteers, the organization has directly impacted over 5,000 people to date.