Country of Residence
Nigeria
Age
20
Project title
Uprise initiative
Project Summary: Describe your project in one sentence
Uprise Initiative is a community focused on building globally relevant changemakers in healthcare through personal growth, professional development, and capacity building. We empower young people with the knowledge, skills, community, accountability, opportunities, mentorship and mindset to thrive professionally and create meaningful impact in their communities and beyond.
Website URL(s) or social media handles.
https://www.linkedin.com/company/uprise-initiative/
Project Category
My project is an existing project that I started
Project Stage
Growth (We’ve moved past the very first activities and are beginning to have consistent weekly or monthly impact)
Founding Story: What was the spark that led you to start your project? What was the "Aha!" moment that led you to get started and see the potential for this to succeed?
As a member of one of the pioneering classes of pharmacy in my school, I never really enjoyed structured mentorship because everyone was still trying to figure things out. The curriculum focused largely on theoretical knowledge and clinical competence, with limited opportunities for personal growth, career development, leadership, and capacity building. My growth and social impact journey was therefore self-directed, involving trial and error. In my earlier years, I thought making an impact required graduating, being wealthy, or having connections. I believed leadership and changemaking were for a select few. However, through my experiences and interactions, I discovered possibilities beyond my immediate environment and realised that it was never too early or too late to create change. Discussions with other students revealed that many shared my experience. They had ideas and potential but lacked the exposure, guidance, community, and opportunities to actualise them. I realised that sharing opportunities alone was not enough; young people also needed a mindset shift, skills, mentorship, accountability, and collaboration to become changemakers. I initially started Uprise as a career development and capacity-building initiative for students in my faculty as Deputy Speaker, but soon realised the problem extended beyond my faculty. That was how Uprise Initiative was founded.
The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve? Why does it matter to you and your community?
A lot of students still do not get involved in capacity-building and social impact initiatives for different reasons. For some, it is because they do not see the need. For others, they are not aware or do not know how to get involved. For many, they lack a community of accountability and peer growth where they can gain access to knowledge, skills, global opportunities and mentorship, build capacity, grow, make an impact, and empower others. In many developing countries like Nigeria, there is a significant gap in the provision of structured opportunities for personal growth, career development, capacity building and mentorship, as academic curricula largely focus on theoretical knowledge. Building globally competent changemakers is even more personal for us in healthcare, where competence can often be the difference between life and death for a patient. Tackling current and future global health challenges demands innovative thinking, leadership, competence, collaboration, and a new generation of healthcare professionals equipped with the skills and mindset to create meaningful change. This is the gap Uprise Initiative seeks to address: not just giving young people access to opportunities, but helping them develop the capacity, mindset, community, and guidance to recognise those opportunities, make the most of them, and ultimately become changemakers who empower others.
Your Solution: How are you solving this problem? Share your specific solution.
Uprise is a youth-focused community for peer growth, mentorship, collaboration, and accountability. We empower young minds with knowledge, skills, opportunities, and a community that helps young people grow into global changemakers. We share opportunities for leadership, social impact, personal and professional development, while organising skills-acquisition programmes for capacity building. We focus on projects that respond to practical gaps young people face. We have hosted webinars such as “Career Development Roadmap for Beginners,” where experienced speakers shared the importance of career development and how to get started as a beginner, “LinkedIn and Locked In,” where participants learnt how to optimise LinkedIn, build visibility, and consistently position themselves for opportunities. “UNIFIED: Tackling Antimicrobial Resistance Collaboratively,” where we brought together healthcare students and professionals from schools across Nigeria to learn, discuss and share perspectives on how we can tackle AntiMicrobial Resistance collaboratively. Beyond these programmes, we hold weekly community sessions every Sunday, where we discuss different topics and challenges, learn from one another, and explore how we can solve problems in our communities. In October, we are organising an “Upskill Marathon” to build communication, research, writing, and data analysis skills. In November, we are planning a secondary-school outreach and webinars featuring changemakers who will share their stories and inspire others to take action. Ultimately, Uprise is not just about sharing opportunities; it is about helping young people develop the mindset, skills, community, and confidence to recognise opportunities, create impact in society, and empower others.
Impact: How has your project created impact / made a difference so far? Or, if at an early stage, what will impact look like?
Uprise Initiative has reached over 300 students through programmes we have hosted or collaborated on. Beyond this, our closed mentorship community, which requires an application to ensure we accept serious, growth-minded individuals and expects active participation and proper communication during absences, has directly impacted over 40 students and currently has 29 committed members on our closed WhatsApp platform. Our participants have learnt practical skills that they can apply beyond the programme. They now have professional CVs and LinkedIn pages that help them document their experiences, build visibility, network, and access opportunities. They have also learnt how to write compelling applications, where and how to strategically seek opportunities, turn ideas into action and impact, turn problems into projects, practise accountability and consistency, communicate their impact effectively, collaborate, and grow through peer learning. Participants have also become more actively involved in community development initiatives and growth opportunities such as the Aspire Leaders Program. Perhaps most importantly, the impact extends beyond our direct participants. As members become more equipped and confident, they are able to take what they have learnt into their own communities and empower others, creating a cycle of impact that uprise was built around.
Your Innovation: What is different about your project compared to other programs or solutions already out there? How is your project new or innovative?
What makes Uprise Initiative different is that we do not just share knowledge, skills, and opportunities; we teach young people where and how to find these opportunities on their own. We want to empower them to eventually empower others, rather than making them dependent on us for access. We also go beyond hosting cohort-based programmes or one-off webinars. We provide a community for peer growth, accountability, collaboration, and mentorship, and we follow up with members to ensure they are not just learning and growing but applying what they have learnt to make an impact. We encourage members to participate in community development initiatives and support them to turn their ideas into action, develop projects, solve problems, and contribute to change. Our approach is therefore focused on long-term growth and application rather than simply programme completion. We also do not organise programmes simply because they are popular or cliché. Our activities are shaped by what we discover young people actually lack and need. This includes helping them develop practical skills, find opportunities, build professional visibility, and, particularly for healthcare students, develop the confidence to share their perspectives, advocate, and take action to protect public health. Ultimately, Uprise is building a community, not just running programmes. Our goal is to develop people who are capable of finding opportunities, collaborating to create solutions, making an impact, and empowering others long after they have participated in any Uprise activity.
How many people are on your team?
5
Your team: What role(s) do your team members play? How do you share leadership with them?
Uprise has five team members (2 females and 3 males), each with defined responsibilities across leadership, operations, community engagement, media and communications, and programmes/resource development. While I provide overall direction as Founder & Executive Director, leadership is shared through a central reporting system where we discuss ideas, review progress, and contribute to decisions before they are finalised. This ensures collective ownership, accountability, and diverse perspectives.
What’s Next: What are the next steps you plan to take to grow or strengthen your project over the next year? If your project is still in the idea stage, describe the steps you will take over the next three months to launch or begin developing it.
Over the next year, our goal is to reach more young people and deepen our impact through partnerships, collaborations, and sponsorships. In October, we are collaborating with the Millennium Fellowship to host the “Upskill Marathon,” equipping young people with practical skills they need to grow and create impact. We also plan to build more partnerships with youth-led initiatives and other organisations. Through my roles as a Theirworld Global Youth Ambassador for SDG 4 and a U-Reporter, I hope to explore opportunities to collaborate with Theirworld and UNICEF’s U-Report to organise physical outreaches to secondary schools, reaching young adolescents early and nurturing their changemaker mindset. Since most of our activities have been virtual due to financial and logistical constraints, we also plan to expand into physical programmes, workshops, and outreaches. Additionally, we want to host "motivated to make change" in November, a webinar featuring young changemakers who would share their stories and inspire others. We believe young people are often inspired by their peers because seeing someone like themselves create change helps them realise that they can do it too. Ultimately the plan is to reach more young people to empower and inspire them to also grow and become changemakers.
How do you encourage other people to join your project or learn about the problem you’re working on? If you have a new idea, tell us how you will do this in the future.
I encourage people to join Uprise by sharing the belief, vision, and mission behind the initiative. The problem is glaring: many young people struggle to realise their potential because they lack mentorship, structured guidance, and access to opportunities. I have also learnt that the more people benefit from a project and witness its impact and growth, the more motivated they become to be part of it. Uprise’s impact in its first three months shows that we are doing something right. Through our programmes and collaborations, we have reached over 300 students, while directly impacting over 40 students through our mentorship community. Participants also share their testimonies, giving the initiative greater credibility and encouraging others to join. Our goal is to reach as many young people as possible and equip them with the mindset, skills, knowledge, and community they need to become global changemakers who empower others. We encourage participation by showing young people possibilities and how to achieve them. We also strive to make our community engaging and inclusive, creating a sense of belonging and helping members connect personally with the problem we are solving. Ultimately, we want people not only to join Uprise but to believe in its mission and become active contributors to the change we seek to create.
