Mohamed Amin

Amin is a Renewable Energy Engineer who started his journey in the development sector in 2017, focusing first on youth empowerment, then widening his perspective to focus more on sustainable development.

Amin believes in the power of building communities either through networking, fostering collaborations, capacity building, or raising awareness. This is why while working at AUC, he focused on supporting local communities and building their capacities. He also worked on promoting solutions and raising awareness during COP27 when he was responsible for the AUC pavilion in the green zone.

In addition, Amin received a certificate to be a trainer in sustainable development from the National Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development.

Now, he is more focused on building collaborative communities in the business and entrepreneurship sectors through his work with ElRehla (The Journey).

Maram Nabil

Maram graduated from Alexandria University as an interior designer. She has always been fond of helping the community ever since her stay in the USA as an exchange student. Her passion inspired her to volunteer and work for local and international organizations in Spain, Poland and the United States while she was at university.

After getting her bachelor’s degree, she applied for the Lazord Fellowship to develop her experience in the community development sector. During the fellowship, she worked as a program officer for research and strategy projects with multiple INGOs such as GIZ, UNIDO and Plan. One of the most beneficial aspects of the program is the research component; she and her team wrote a research paper on, “Programs that Support Youth without Parental Care in Egypt.” The findings and the recommendations have inspired partner organizations to consider changing their programs and policies. Her team won the Lazord research competition in Egypt.

Currently, she works as a program assistant for the global initiative WISE at Ashoka Arab World. She is responsible for activities targeting Arab women social entrepreneurs in the region.

Along with her work experience, she also became a certified trainer for gender and civic engagement through Goethe Institute, and is an advocate for minority groups rights in the region by the MRG.

Nehal Attiya

The whole story about Nehal’s fondness for the development sector started with using handicrafts, colors and music in different artistic ways, leading to her passion towards informal education. Working with kids from different backgrounds and situations in Egypt and Italy showed her the importance of mental health for kids.

With the experience Nehal has in facilitating, researching, curriculum designing, and proposal writing, she started to wonder about more knowledge to enable her to connect artistic products of kids to their personalities, in order to understand more their psychological and emotional needs. This will help her develop a customized curriculum, and one day, achieve her life goal of creating an Art Therapy School.

She would like to deepen her knowledge in project management and explore more fields. Now she works in the social entrepreneurship field, a field she finds very interesting, rich, and inspiring. She believes that this will help her explore and deepen her overall knowledge and experiences.

Yousra Khalil

Yousra is a driven young development practitioner. She began her career as a translator, international and slum educator, and researcher during university. She was passionate about research, yet she always wanted to work on the ground and be closer to the beneficiaries, particularly when it came to providing education assistance to underprivileged communities. This became true after joining in the Lazord Fellowship. She not only gained new knowledge and abilities, but she also became involved in MEAL activities that allowed her to integrate her research abilities with her enthusiasm for field work.

On the personal level, Yousra is a cat rescuer, an enthusiast of Islamic heritage and architecture, interested in urbanism, and she presently plans to learn more about advocacy and activism.

Shaimaa Abdelrahman

Shaimaa is a young doctor with a great interest in the field of global health, especially regarding sexual and reproductive health and rights as well as gender equality. During her years in university, she engaged with the International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA) and held several positions including Program Coordinator on GBV and National Officer on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights including HIV & AIDs in Egypt. Through the Lazord Fellowship, she is currently placed at IOM Egypt, in the Health Unit.

“Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” This quote literally changed Shaimaa’s life.

Areeg Badawy

Areeg graduated from Cairo University with a degree in veterinary medicine. However, she loves to identify herself as a social activist and an advocate for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals through working to enhance young people’s sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and reducing the gender gap. Areeg is an experienced trainer in the field of peer education, SRHR, and gender. Her interest in the field of SRHR has grown through being a peer educator in Y-peer for 3 years, and serving now as a MEL officer in USAID-funded project OSRA.

If Areeg had a superpower, she would want to be able to plant diverse types of trees and crops in all deserted areas around the world.

Beshoy Magdy

Beshoy received his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering. During his time in college he volunteered in different activities like ENACTUS, as he believes in the power of entrepreneurship and its positive impact on people’s lives. He represented his country in international programs focused on gender and environment in Japan, Vietnam, and Malaysia, which gave him a new perspective on global challenges.

He saw that the Lazord Fellowship was an exceptional-just-in-time opportunity to explore civic engagement on a deeper level. Through the fellowship, he is placed at USAID, working on a program that seeks to provide safe work environments for women in Egypt and to change private sector policies to be more inclusive for women.

If Beshoy had a superpower, he would like it to be the power to make people accept each other and live in peace.

Mohamed El Fetyany

Mohamed was born and raised in Alexandria City until he obtained his bachelor’s degree. His journey in civil society started when he was 11 years old. He used to volunteer in local NGOs and participated in many projects in Bibliotheca Alexandrina. He went to the EU delegation in Cairo while participating in the Model European Union as a member of the Parliament Council. In the same year he worked on a project funded by UNHCR. At this time, he found his passion working in the development field. In his second year of university he started volunteering at Caritas Egypt-Alexandria office. He was responsible for the Fundraising Committee as a team leader. He considers the Lazord Fellowship as a golden opportunity, especially since he was placed at the International Organization for Migration (IOM), which will allow him to promote his professional skills and gain all the experience he needs for the future.

“I want to inspire many people in the future. I want someone to said because of you, I didn’t give up.”

Khedr Wanas

Khedr received his bachelor’s degree in economics from Cairo University. He has strong belief in the power of knowledge and how it can contribute to change the reality. His professional areas of interest focus on social entrepreneurship, social development, behavioral economics, public policy, economic empowerment and gender.

He currently works as research assistant at the regional search and selection team at Ashoka Arab World. Khedr contributes to the search and identification of leading changemakers across the the MENA region. Moreover, he supports them to showcase their work and scale their impact.

Khedr published his first peer-reviewed publication for his work in behavioral economics in August 2021. As an undergraduate, Khedr co-founded the first student-led debate initiative in Cairo. In addition, he was selected to be the president of one of the elite student activities at Cairo University, Model of the Egyptian Stock Exchange (MESE).

Along this journey, Khedr has acquired a multidisciplinary set of skills, including but not limited to: research, facilitation, data collection/analysis, economic analysis, and visionary leadership. In the long term, Khedr aspires to design evidence-based policies and interventions to address the complex community challenges.

“Knowledge is not power, it is only potential. Applying that knowledge is power.” – Takeda Shingen

Yasmine Bebars

Yasmine graduated from the Faculty of Pharmacy at Ain Shams University in 2021. She is a multi-talented pharmacist experienced in training, SDGs, and coordination. Driven by her passion to help others and make an impact, she has been working in the civic community since 2018.

She is a SDGs ambassador at the Ministry of Planning and Economic Development, working on spreading awareness in order to achieve Egypt Vision 2030. Believing in the impact of education, Yasmine has been working as a trainer and a facilitator in different organisations such as EYouth, Young Mediterranean Voices (YMV) debate program with the British Council, and the Goethe Civic Education program.

Currently as a Lazord Fellow, she is placed at the Centre of Development Services (CDS) in the health unit as she hopes to find the connection between her education and her passion. She wants to work in the public health sector and promote development in the healthcare system.

If she had a superpower, she would like to have the ability to see each person’s capabilities and to put them to use in the right place.