About the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders

Author: Professor Wendy M. Purcell PhD FRSA, Rutgers University, USA

The Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders [1] is the flagship program of the U.S. Government’s Young African Leaders Initiative [2] (YALI). Established in 2014, the Fellowship has brought nearly 7,200 young leaders from every country in Sub-Saharan Africa to the United States for academic and leadership training. The Fellows, between the ages of 25 and 35, are accomplished innovators and leaders in their communities and countries.

Rutgers [3], The State University of New Jersey, has hosted a Mandela Washington Fellowship Institute since the inception of the program in 2014 and a Leadership in Business Institute each year since 2016. During their time at the university, Johanna Bernstein [4] (Assistant Dean for Global Programs at Rutgers Global) and Dr. Kevin Lyons [5] (Professor of Professional Practice at the Rutgers Business School), invite fellows to participate in leadership sessions, academic exercises, and site visits to better understand the inception, development, and commercialization of game-changing enterprises.

Mandela Washington Fellows 2025 at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

During the summer 2025 Institute, Dr. Wendy M. Purcell [6] (Professor in the Rutgers School of Public Health), Goal Adviser [7] to Emerald Publishing Limited in support of their Fairer Society mission, led a session with the Mandela Fellows on “Should Billionaires Exist?”. A lively dialogue ensued and several of the Fellows went on to create blogs to add their voices to this important debate on fairness in creating a world that leaves no one behind – the ultimate outcome aim of the Sustainable Development Goals[8]. 

References

[1] https://www.mandelawashingtonfellowship.org/
[2] https://yali.state.gov/
[3] https://www.rutgers.edu/
[4] https://ol.rutgers.edu/rutgers-people/johanna-bernstein/
[5] https://www.business.rutgers.edu/faculty/kevin-lyons
[6] https://sph.rutgers.edu/directory/wendy-purcell
[7] https://www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/our-goals/fairer-society
[8] https://sdgs.un.org/goals