The graduation ceremony took place at the Emara Ole Sereni Hotel in Nairobi on Friday.

Inspired by the late Sulley Gariba, a Ghanaian thought leader in the MEL and international development sectors, the Mastercard Foundation launched the YIA Program in 2022 with the aspiration to engage and inspire a new and dynamic generation of young African professionals to transform the impact measurement field.

“The Young Impact Associates (YIA) Program was launched to prepare and inspire a new and dynamic generation of young African professionals to innovate and lead the transformation of the impact field by placing youth, their communities, and partners at the core of how we understand, measure, and enable impact at scale,” Antonio Capillo, Director of MEL Innovation and Impact Labs at the Mastercard Foundation, said.

“We wish the young graduates the very best in their journey and anticipate their leading impact on the continent,” he added.

The first phase of the YIA Program was collaboratively developed by the Mastercard Foundation Impact Team and its Impact Partner Organisations (IPOs) in five Young Africa Works strategy countries (Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Ghana, and Nigeria).

In the coming months, the first cohort of 59 Young Impact Associates will graduate.

Ultimately, the program aims to help the YIA program participants access dignified and fulfilling work opportunities in the field of MEL and shape the MEL debate, among other opportunities.

The Mastercard Foundation’s partnership with Research PLUS Africa involved designing, managing, and delivering the YIA program’s one-year training curriculum, integrating context-relevant impact theory and practice, leadership development, and on-the-job experience.

“Africa is home to many development programmes; the YIA platform is an excellent opportunity to develop home-grown skills that will elevate the MEL space into one that recognizes the uniqueness of our continent and apply methodologies that are empathetic to the African context,” Salline Handa, Team Lead for the impact partner organization Research PLUS Africa, said.

“We are excited to partner with the Mastercard Foundation and to be part of an ecosystem that does not only channel out professionals, but one that examines their interest in the development space, equips them with the necessary skills and provides them an opportunity for pupillage under the wings of senior local MEL professionals,” Handa said.

“We are in a unique space to not only grow individuals but to enrich the value chain in evaluating programmes through locally grown expertise. We look forward to continually decolonize the MEL space and provide actionable insights for programme implementation and evaluation.”

The graduates expressed that the program has not only provided them with valuable knowledge and skills but also broadened their perspectives within the realm of monitoring and evaluation.

“The Young Impact Associates Programme is dear to our hearts. It aligns to our vision of taking research, and of course MEL, to greater heights in Africa and value on talent nurturing. This, for us, begins by demystifying what it is and grounding it in our reality,” Faith Ronoh-Boreh, Program Lead at Research PLUS Africa, stated.