We are a team of passion-driven young people working to improve livelihood skills and access to comprehensive sexual and health education and services for young people in Nigeria and Africa.
Programme Lead
MaryJane Nweje is a medical doctor and global health expert with over 5 years of experience delivering successful local and international global health initiatives through research, communications, and policy engagement and advocacy. She is very passionate about adolescent health, and she decided to work in global health because she had first-hand experience with how inaccessibility to health and social care negatively influences the lives of young people, particularly girls. She has robust experience supporting the implementation of global health policy interventions with skills in research, proposal development, stakeholder analysis and engagement, programme operations, policy drafting, and dissemination.
MaryJane is a multi-award winner. In 2020, she won the Commonwealth Masters, Commonwealth Shared, and ExxonMobil Global health scholarships in 2020 to study in high-ranking universities in the United Kingdom. She recently received the Young African Women Leads Award in the Health category and was selected by the United Nations Women Nigeria as a Leading Youth Using Technology to Promote Gender Quality & Women’s Empowerment in March 2023.
MaryJane holds an MBBS degree from Enugu State University in Nigeria, graduating 2nd best in her class with a distinction, and an MSc in International Health and Tropical Medicine from the University of Oxford. She is also an alumna of the Washington Department of Global Health, the Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) Emerging Leaders Programme West Africa, and the African Change-makers Initiative.
Operations Associate
Garba Abdullahi is a Social Justice and Youth Activist with over 6 years of experience supporting local and international programmes that promote youth empowerment and education in Nigeria through project operations support. Garba possesses solid organisational and management skills, which he utilises to drive several projects to their success. He is also an anti-corruption activist who lends his voice to garner support for marginalised communities in Nigeria.
Garba worked with Dean Initiative to lead the largest SDGs action drives in Nigeria through collaboration with World Largest Lesson UK in 2018. He holds a degree in Nutrition and Deictics from Federal Polytechnic Bida, Niger State, Nigeria, and during his leisure time, he enjoys reading and traveling.
Education Associate
Solomon Ijauka is a Social Activist, Peer, and Interpersonal mediator from Insight Global Services. His pursuit for social change and impact has led him to volunteer for several organisations like Youth Hub Africa, Leap Africa, and LC4D Foundation, as a Peer educator, Community influencer, and SGBV advocate. He has been featured and recognised for his efforts in Ripple live show, Click Naija, and Lola Carter for the Need and Teenage network in various capacities as a speaker and moderator. He is a Trainer, an Educator, and a Student Currently enrolled in the Community Health Extension Program in Nigeria to equip him with best practices in Communal Advocacy. He is a member of the Change Agent Fellowship, an Affiliate of the Apostles in the Market Place (AiMP), and JONAPWD (Joint Association of Persons With Disability).
Solomon is also the CEO and founder of Outlook & Fixers, a Fashion brand that majors in Alteration, Amendments, and Fashion complimentary for all, especially for persons with disabilities.
Volunteers Associate
Peter Emmanuel Akpan is a social activist with over 7 years of experience in community engagement and development. He has considerable experience in promoting community projects that deliver support in the sexual health and sexual violence space. Peter is passionate about supporting young people in his community and engages in development and mentor initiatives for young people to be leaders in their communities. He is driven and committed to continuous learning through personal and professional development endeavours
Peter holds a BSc (Hons.) Biochemistry from the University of Calabar, Nigeria, with multiple diploma certifications in management and psychology.
IT & Brand Associate
Adenike Ogunmodede is a Frontend Developer with over 3 years of experience supporting local and international programmes that promote youth empowerment and education in Nigeria. She possesses solid communications and organisational skills, which she leverages to drive several projects to their success. As a front-end developer, she writes code that implements web designs into functional websites as well as wears the designer hat to design user-friendly interfaces. She is passionate about community development and youth empowerment and volunteers her skills with Jika Adolescent hub as a Communications Associate.
Adenike has undertaken multiple trainings in frontend web development, communication and advocacy for gender equality and is has recently commenced the McKinsey Forward Program. She also holds a BSc degree in Economics from the University of Abuja, Nigeria.
Communications & Advocacy Associate
Mercy Ajeh is a passionate advocate of the Sustainable Development Goals in Nigeria and a Social Impact Communications Manager.
She uses her skills as a media and communications strategist to raise awareness about social issues and advocate for change through media campaigns, conversations, and storytelling for advocacy.
She hopes to see a world where everyone is treated right regardless of their status, class, or background, and she believes that the SDGs are a great tool for achieving this if everyone gets involved.
Sandra Adele is a scientist with a background in immunology and global health. She is currently studying for her PhD in clinical medicine at the University of Oxford. Her research focuses on understanding the immunology of infectious diseases such as COVID-19. Using bioinformatics and laboratory research, her work addresses questions such as the magnitude and duration of vaccine-acquired immunity. Sandra is also an epidemiologist at the World Health Organization in the COVID-19 Intelligence unit, where she works on identifying signals related to potential COVID-19 variants through indicator and event-based surveillance and their phenotypic implications, as well as rapid and comprehensive risk assessments. She is passionate about youth empowerment and promoting STEM awareness and has been involved in various youth programs as a tutor, such as the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth in Maryland.
Omolayo Anjorin is a medical doctor and seasoned researcher with over a decade of experience in clinical care, global health implementation and research, psychosocial support, health consulting, and project management. She is passionate about innovative Mental and Behavioural Health solutions. She co-founded Youth4Youth Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to closing socioeconomic gaps and providing community psychosocial healthcare support.
Omolayo is committed to evidential implementation for improved health and development outcomes through ethical, co-created, and context-relevant solutions. She aims to utilise multi-level networks and federal and non-governmental organisations, to support the research, advocacy, and implementation of contextually relevant mental health programs to drive awareness, treat and prevent mental health disorders, specifically for adolescents and youth.
Jason Quist is a highly skilled GMC-registered medical professional with a decade of experience delivering quality care to patients in a variety of healthcare systems around the world. He is passionate about leveraging emerging and advanced information technology tools to enhance the delivery of quality healthcare services globally. Jason is also a strong advocate for promoting youth and adolescent health through education and sports and actively supports various youth-led and youth-focused organisations in Nigeria by providing technical, clinical, and educational support.
Jason co-founded Nitmedtutorials, the first privately owned medical education platform in Nigeria, which has provided training to over 1000 medical professionals with a 98% success rate. Additionally, he established Medtutoria, a charitable medical e-learning platform in Ghana.
Jason holds a medical degree from Ivan Horbachevsky Ternopil National Medical University and is an alumnus of the University of Washington. He has also undertaken training in advanced healthcare delivery, global health, and disease epidemiology.
