Ashesi Awarded Again! Microsoft Alumni Foundation 2009 Integral Fellow

It seems Ashesi Founder Patrick Awuah is on a winning streak - This week, he was honored with the 2009 Integral Fellow Award by his former employer, Microsoft. See press release here and finalist video above.

The mission of the award is

to catalyze the collective power of the Microsoft alumni and leverage our resources on innovative, scalable, transformative solutions to our world’s challenges. Integral Fellows serve as that catalyst, sharing their stories of struggle, success, and inspiration.

Even though I am not particularly a fan of Microsoft, I must say it really impresses me to hear about them having an "alumni" foundation. It is something very modern about a company suggesting that employees will at some point "graduate", not quit (or stay the rest of their working lives). So far, none of my former workplaces have considered me an alum - but I guess they should. I still care about what is going on where I have spent thousands of productive hours and I owe much of my success to what I have learned with them - and I guess it reflects well on them too when I do well elsewhere.

Is this the new work market we see unfolding?

Ashesi Founder Recieves Prize

Woke up this morning to some very fine news. My employer received the John P. McNulty Prize of USD 100,000 with this wonderful motivation:

"In Patrick Awuah we have found not only immense personal leadership in founding Ashesi, one of the African continent's first liberal arts universities, but in the school's commitment to ethics and civics as a central part of education, he has guaranteed future generations of leaders for Ghana, Africa and the world."

Read the whole press release here.

I am proud to go to work today!

Patrick Awuah and I at a conference in August 2008.

Ashesi Campus Groundbreaking in Berekuso

On Saturday, I was fortunate to experience the groundbreaking - or sod-cutting - of the new Ashesi University Campus in Berekuso, up in the Akuapim Hills in Ghana. This beautiful hill lies about an hour drive north of Accra and was breezy and green on this joyous day.

The university which is currently housed in a residential area in down-town Accra, hopes on this campus extend its student population from 400 to 600 and of course provide a less distracting and more beautiful environment.

The ceremony came off to a bit of a late start, but that was lucky since the townfolk of Berekuso had to climb the steep hill by foot and arrived just in time for the chiefs' arrival. I can safely say all of Berekuso town were there, small and big, clad in gold, colorful cloths or in school uniform.

The whole experience was wonderful, but I think the most touching part of the day was when the chief explained how welcome the university was by telling us that a residential developer had inquired about purchasing that very hill for a project.

- But we would rather have an educational institution here in Berekuso.

Or maybe the most emotional part was when we cheered for Patric Awuah, the founder of the University during the presentation of dignitaries. And then his mother was introduced and the crowd went from loud cheer to complete euphoria!(Gotta love the Ghanaian mother-centered culture!)

Other articles on this event were written by Friends of Ashesi/Todd Warren, Peace FM, and the official version here.