by Tasmiah Akter
I met Lois Amponsah at the beginning of her freshman year on a field trip to the United Nations. The trip was focused around social entrepreneurship and we got to hear from people who were on the ground running their own organizations. A year and a half later, I get to interview Lois on the incredible work she does in Ghana and report on it.
Lois and I agreed to meet around 10 am on a Thursday morning. I start by asking her about her majors on campus to understand her academic background. She tells me she’s a Neuroscience & Behavior and Economics double major. She is also a Global Engagement Minor. I didn’t tell her that I already knew about the Neuroscience part – I had been talking to my friends about this new assignment and one of them told me that they had seen her around in their STEM classes and assumed Lois was pre-med – and they were right. Lois loves studying the brain and that she wants to specialize in neurosurgery. I asked her why she was an Economics double major then – what was the connection between the two, if any? She tells me that for her, both majors were quite separate and that they were a means to different ends. From what I could gather, her Neuroscience major was about personal fulfillment and the Economics major was a method to ensure the practical success of her NGO. For example, with her Economics course work, she could understand how inflation worked in her home country, Ghana. Lois also loves being a Global Engagement Minor (GEM) because of the opportunity to be exposed to different cultures, meet speakers from all walks of life, and learn from her peers and speakers about different strategies to run her NGO well.
The NGO Lois runs is called Wings of Change, “a non-profit organization that empowers the youth and communities of Ghana through education, entrepreneurship, and innovation.” Its central location is in Donaso, which is near her hometown, Ejisu Abenase. While she’s away, a woman named Mary Kyerewaa runs the organization. Lois checks in with her on weekends to make sure everything is running smoothly.
What inspired her to start Wings of Change was a commitment to making impactful and meaningful change in her community and then eventually Ghana as a whole. It started off as a fundraising project where she and her friends raised funds to donate clothes and books. After this project ended, Lois realized that she wanted to start something more long-term, especially for teenagers aged 13-19 like her who were brimming with ideas. That’s when she revamped this project to be more entrepreneurship focused with an emphasis on bridging the gap between education and entrepreneurship. In other words, Wings of Change takes people’s nascent business ideas and helps them through every step to start and maintain a successful business. They teach about marketing, investing, run workshops to inform people on how to get a loan, and so much more. It serves as both a collaborative space to grow together and a place to receive mentorship. People in the program are exposed to business owners who have been successful in starting their own businesses from the ground up and learn about how these entrepreneurs have sustained their businesses. Mentors can be anyone – someone who started a business in college or someone who is the CEO of a well-known company in Ghana, like Janet Abobigu of Unijay Company Ltd. She was able to connect with Abobigu through a Wesleyan alum named Kosi Ynakey-Ayeh. Unijay Company Ltd started small with sewing uniforms for corporate Ghanian employees. Abobigu then got more funding, and now runs a successful company which mass produces the uniform that corporate employees in Ghana wear daily. Using her Wesleyan network, Lois was able to take her students to meet Abobigu to learn more about her story and how she runs Unijay Company Ltd.
When I asked Lois for an anecdote that keeps her drive alive for Wings of Change (because running an NGO as a full time student and from abroad is no easy feat), she told me a story about the second-ever project her NGO led. For this second project, she and her team traveled to another town. This is when she wanted to hone in on the entrepreneurship aspect of Wings of Change and empower the youth in Ghana. At this town’s local school, Lois spoke to the headmaster of the school to spread the word about her organization and recruit any future entrepreneurs. The headmaster loved her idea and asked her to meet with a student named Offei Emmanuel. Offei Emmanuel was known to take scrap parts of electronics (like a radio) and make something new. Once, he made a functional computer. This inspired her to organize a competition as an incentive for joining the program. In the competition, kids were asked to pitch their ideas and explain how they would sustain their businesses. Offei Emmanuel was asked if Lois’ NGO could help him with anything, and he asked for parts to make a drone. After he received the parts, he made the drone, he pitched his idea on how he would sustain a business, and then he won the competition. Moments like these are what keep Lois going everyday.
As our conversation came to a close, I asked Lois about what sorts of things she’d like the Wesleyan community to know about Wings for Change. She said, “In any way that they can support, like through video editing skills, taking pictures, and making educational videos for the web page, I’m open to welcoming people to join and grow the organization more.” If you’re interested, shoot her an email at lamponsah@wesleyan.edu.
In the meantime, you might find Lois working on some biology homework, attending collegiate conferences on the weekend, or playing guitar at her local church. Wesleyan students can do it all.
