Theme: Dare to Disrupt

TEDxALURwanda is founded in the spirit of TED’s mission of Ideas Worth Spreading. The student-led organisation’s goal is to create unique experiences composed of interdisciplinary talks and engaging exchanges for all attendees.
We aim to provide a compelling experience through sharing ideas that change attitudes by bringing together the African Leadership University community with the global Audience. We challenge all our attendees to share, open up and be curious. We are of the strong belief that the TEDxALURwanda experience starts with reserving the ticket and continues through attending the event and goes on beyond the event.

Kigali City Hall
KN 3 Ave, Kigali
Kigali, Ville de Kigali, 10100
Rwanda

ALUpella

Acapella Group

Singing composed of students from the African Leadership University

Anysie Ishimwe

Senior Business Analyst

Anysie Ishimwe is a trailblazing Rwandan currently working as a senior business analyst at Karisimbi Business partners, a leading and socially motivated management consulting firm in Kigali. In this role, she uses research to advise businesses on how to run efficiently, invests their resources wisely, and maximize their social impact. Anysie sits on the board of Sager Ganza Microfinance, a microfinance institution committed to economically uplift women and youth in rural areas to have access to financial products tailored to their specific needs and goals. A natural problem solver and activist, Anysie is a World Economic Forum global shaper and the Vice-Curator of the Kigali Hub. Anysie is also a proud alumnus of Global Health Corps, a leadership development accelerator through which she worked with Gardens for health international on the implementation of nutrition projects in two of the largest refugee camps in Rwanda and 104 schools across Rwanda.

Christelle Kwizera

Mechanical Engineer, Social Entrepreneur and Activist

Christelle Kwizera, 25, is a Rwandan mechanical engineer and social entrepreneur. In 2014, Christelle founded Water Access Rwanda, an award-winning innovative social enterprise offering tailor-made solutions in the field of collection, distribution and purification of water. The enterprise has provided water to over 100,000 Rwandans through a network of 95 boreholes and INUMA™️ purified clean water microgrids. Water Access Rwanda was the only Rwandan enterprise to ever be awarded with the prestigious Africa Entrepreneurship Award. Her work in water and geophysics has also seen her train and support the development of social water businesses across the African continent with Water4. Christelle was also recognized as the Woman Entrepreneur of the Year this March in Paris by INCO with support from the Chanel Foundation.

Fhatuwani Innocent Mukheli

Photographer and Creative

I See A Different You came about in 2011 at a time when our four founding members were working in the advertising industry. They started to become increasingly aware of the pervasive misconceptions surrounding Soweto. The public, led by the media, have a tendency to see Soweto as a starving, burning place of desperation and unrest. Our aim is to reframe images from our own life stories, as well as the stories of others, and bring an alternative view of South Africa to a global audience. Our images show the South African experience, and our love and optimism for the people we share our country with.

Kevin Rugamba

Founder and Director at Pineapple Undertones

Pineapple Undertones is an edutainment company that seeks to uncover, explore and promote African musical traditions by preserving the past and documenting the present in order to take greater ownership of the future of African music culture. It highlights and celebrates the rich diversity and connectedness of sounds that have been emanating through time from the African continent and from the African diaspora. Its mission is to enable a more conscious appreciation for the diversity of sounds that find roots in the African musical identity. The aim is to inspire consumers and creators alike to take greater ownership of the narrative, direction, and influence of African music culture worldwide. Its current activities mainly consist of live DJ gigs, an online DJ mix series, and interactive workshops

Kwame Norvixoxo

Researcher and Course Facilitator

Hailing from Ghana in West Africa. Born on a curfew night in a sprawling suburban town called Ashaiman, Kwame has threaded the eye of many needles in an effort to attain good education and the experiences that come with it. This quest for knowledge, high and beyond what his environment could provide at the time, saw him taking advantage of opportunities to work and study across East, West and Southern Africa, as well as Asia and Europe. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Development Policy Planning from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (Kumasi, Ghana), a Master Degree in Integrated Watershed Management from Kenyatta University (Nairobi, Kenya) and is currently pursuing his doctorate degree in the area of sustainable urban sanitation at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He is also currently a Facilitator at the African Leadership University in Kigali, Rwanda. He is a poet, photographer and motivational speaker.

Micheal Makembe

Rwandan Singer

Recording young artist

Patrick Sikalinda

Entrepreneur and Data Scientist

Patrick Sikalinda is a co-founder and Data Scientist at AgriPredict, where he leads, trains and develops Deep/Machine Learning models, USSD development and VR technologies). Currently working on improving one-shot learning for image classification using Memory Augmented Neural Networks for classification problems with smaller datasets.

Steve Miles

Head of Training

Steve has over 25 years of experience in developing people in charity, sport, faith, business and international development sectors. He has a passion to see people thrive and a heart bias to invest in the worlds most vulnerable – shaped by life-changing encounters in Asia, Africa & South America. He believes learning is best received when it is engaging, creative, relevant & fun. He loves all things sport, great coffee and dabbling at culinary delights in the kitchen.

Vuyo Mpantsha

Photographer and Creative

I See A Different You came about in 2011 at a time when our four founding members were working in the advertising industry. They started to become increasingly aware of the pervasive misconceptions surrounding Soweto. The public, led by the media, have a tendency to see Soweto as a starving, burning place of desperation and unrest. Our aim is to reframe images from our own life stories, as well as the stories of others, and bring an alternative view of South Africa to a global audience. Our images show the South African experience, and our love and optimism for the people we share our country with.

Zulaikha Patel

Activist, BCCs 100 Most Influential Womxn 2016, Director at Kidz of Biko

She is an activist , her work is deep-rooted in ideologies of decolonization, elevating black Consciousness in the 21st century , and radical Black feminism, focusing on advocating for young Black womxn who have faced identity backlash from our Eurocentric influenced society and overall championing the movement for young womxn to occupy leadership positions and access social justice and rights. I'm also a writer, my work seeks to honour black history and heritage. She was among the students who led a demonstration against Pretoria Girls High, against the all-girl school's hair policy. The demonstrating teenagers were threatened with arrest as Zulaikha Patel led the silent protest. A video posted online showed Zulaikha Patel's calm defiance as she faced three armed security guards who were hired by the school management to break up the demonstration. Her actions inspired other protests in South Africa.