Hello everyone! My name is Hijab Khan, and I am joining the Girls Education Collaborative as the first GEC Fellow. I am so excited to be a part of this team!
Women’s empowerment is a passion of mine. I believe that empowered women are able to flourish and affect immense positive change in their environments. After graduating from Cornell University this past May, having spent most of my time studying and conducting research in the global health field, I hoped to find work that would combine my interest in women’s empowerment and health. Most of my research experience was in Tanzania, so I was also searching for a position that would allow me to continue learning and working there. I was lucky enough to find GEC in my own hometown of Buffalo! Education is both key to empowerment and correlated to a healthier life.
As the GEC Fellow I have a number of responsibilities. I am starting by helping to build a monitoring and evaluation plan to understand and improve the performance of the Kitenga School for Girls, scheduled to open in January 2017. I am grateful for this opportunity, and I look forward to meeting and collaborating with likeminded people who see education as a means to empowerment for girls everywhere.