Tsega joined Ashoka Changemakers as New Media Coordinator. Tsega’s passion for social change is rooted in her upbringing in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia observing disproportion in society and feeling an urgency to affect change. This inspired her involvement and leadership in philanthropic projects from a young age when she co-founded a drought relief project. Her involvement in community and online engagement projects continued with her leadership in the international Ethiopian Student Association (which functioned offline and online) and building a writer’s collective site to shift narratives and amplify voices of women in the African Diaspora. She has a strong interest in social innovation to re-imagine the business landscape, technology, Africa’s development, and the empowerment of individuals as change-agents. Tsega has supported the mHealth Alliance/UN Foundation social media strategy and written for an NGO building innovative technologies for developing communities where she focused on profiling technology solutions disrupting the African market. In a project analyst capacity, she has worked on the management and funding of health research and innovation in the National Institutes of Health. Tsega also worked on partnership building for a social innovation fellowship that enables future social innovators. Recently, Tsega has continued her involvement in building platforms that shift the African narrative through a project focused on shifting the way people talk about famine and the Horn of Africa. Tsega has a Bachelors of Science in International Studies and Biochemistry from the University of Richmond and gets excited about exploring different cultures, techy stuff, photography and photography apps.
