Joel Baraka

Why you should listen

Joel Baraka is the founder of My Home Stars, a nonprofit with the mission of making education accessible to refugee children in Uganda. After growing up and attending school in the Kyangwali refugee camp in Uganda, he was driven to improve education access to fellow refugee children. He is the designer of 5 STAZ, an educational board game that aims to get children excited about learning. Inspired by his dad's work, who learned masonry craftsmanship despite no formal education, Baraka pursued a civil engineering degree in college. He hopes to imagine what better living conditions could look like -- both in terms of better housing and better education for communities such as the Kynagwali refugee camp. He is a 2016 Bezos Scholar.