USAP Zimbabwe Profiles
Since it's inception in 1999, USAP has helped tens of Zimbabwean students get accepted to top notch colleges in the United States. Some have since graduated and are working in various fields in the United States and elsewhere around the world and some have chosen to remain in academia at various instituations in the United States. There are over a hundred USAP students from Zimbabwe alone and each one of them has an amazing story to tell. Below are brief profiles of some of our students just to give you a glimpse of our diversity as a people as well as the diversity of our their career paths and futures.
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Tafadzwa Muguwe
Swarthmore College '05
University of Oxford, UK '07
Harvard Medical School & MIT '11
Tafadzwa Muguwe is an associate in the healthcare practice at McKinsey & Company in Palo Alto, CA. Previously he completed residency in internal medicine at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA and also served as a resident tutor for undergraduates in Cabot House at Harvard College. He received his M.D. degree from the Health Sciences and Technology (HST) program at Harvard and MIT. Tafadzwa hails from the Midlands city of Gweru where he was born. His year is not complete without a trip to the hometown. He completed Ordinary and Advanced Level at Kutama High School and entered Swarthmore College on a full scholarship, graduating Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in biology. At graduation he received the Ivy Award, 'given by vote of the faculty to the senior man outstanding in leadership, scholarship, and contribution to the college community'. He subsequently spent two years as a Rhodes Scholar in Oxford where he read for M.Sc. degrees in immunology and global health. Tafadzwa is a marathon-enthusiast and has completed 4 races to date. He closely follows professional tennis and soccer. As far as American sports are concerned, Tafadzwa is certifiably a failed graft. He is more than happy to chat with anyone, please feel free to reach out.
Anywhere "Siko" Sikochi
Middlebury College '05
Darden School of Business, MBA '11
Penn State University, PhD '16 (Expected)
Anywhere (Siko) Sikochi is currently a PhD Candidate in Business Administration, with a concentration in Accounting at the Pennsylvania State University Smeal College of Business. Siko is a recipient of the KPMG Doctoral Scholarship and is a member of the KPMG PhD Project Accounting Doctoral Student Association. Following his first year of the accounting doctoral program at Penn State, Siko received the W. Edward and Kay M. Hastings Graduate Scholarship, and the Frank P. and Mary Jean Smeal Endowment Fund scholarship for academic performance and research promise. Siko conducts empirical academic research in the area of corporate disclosure and financial markets, and has interests in research questions that contribute to regulatory and policy debates.
Siko recently completed an MBA from Darden Graduate School of Business, University of Virginia. Prior to Darden, Siko was an Associate in the Financial Markets and Life Sciences Practices at CRA International, Inc. He joined CRA in Boston as an Analyst in their Financial Markets group, and was promoted to Associate in the same year in 2007. He then transferred to the Life Sciences practice in Washington, D.C. in 2008. Prior to joining CRA International, he was a Consultant with FTI Consulting based in the Harvard Square office in Cambridge, MA.
Having been selected into USAP in 2000, he was able to attend college in the United States on a full scholarship from Middlebury College, Vermont. In May of 2005, he graduated magna cum laude with double major in Economics and Russian (with departmental honors in Russian). During his four years at Middlebury College he held a number of leadership positions as well as traveled for study abroad in Moscow. While in Moscow, he interned with the Educational Advising center; he worked with the first group of USAP students from Russia. He also did two other internships during his undergraduate career, first in Zimbabwe with the US Education Advising on a grant from the Department of State, and then at the Boston Federal Reserve Bank.
Siko continues to be involved with his local community and family in Zimbabwe. Over the last ten years since coming to the United States, he has helped in efforts that provided financial and other support to students at the primary through the University level. In his spare time, Siko enjoys reading and running. He has completed two marathons, one half-marathon, and several shorter races since 2006. Most importantly, Siko enjoys being a father and a husband. He and his wife Shlawna are proud parents of two daughters, Satriah Erina (born 2009) and Ruvarashe Lee (born 2012). For Siko the sky is the limit, and it all was made possible through USAP!
Rainos Alma Mutamba
Trent University, Canada '05
University of Toronto, MSW '10
University of Toronto, PhD
Rainos Moyo Mutamba (Mutamba) is a father, Mbira musician, storyteller, community organizer and PhD student at Ontario Institute of Studies in Education (OISE) at the University of Toronto. Mutamba was born in a village called Madhege in Gutu Zimbabwe. Mutamba did his early education at Shingayi Primary School in Chiredzi, Devuli Primary School in Birchenough Bridge, Goko Primary School in Goko and Chepiri Primary School in Chepiri, Gutu. He went on to do his secondary school at Mutambwi Secondary School and completed his Advanced Levels at Harare High School in Mbare, Harare. Through the support of the United States Achiever's Program, he was awarded an International scholarship by the Trent International Program at Trent University where he completed a B.A. in Economics. After working in Toronto coordinating an HIV/AIDS and Harm Reduction Program, Mutamba went on to complete his Masters of Social Work at the University of Toronto. Currently, Mutamba is a PhD student at the University of Toronto where he is doing research on the possibilities of grassroots social movements that work from indigenous frameworks.
Mutamba has worked with communities in Canada and Zimbabwe to support local and international social justice efforts. Mutamba has been focused on supporting those affected by HIV/AIDS as well as the revitalization of indigenous ways of being. Mutamba has been personally affected by HIV/AIDS and has dedicated his life to support communities who continue to be affected. He continues to be invited to speak at conferences, community gatherings, and classrooms on diverse topics from continental African politics, HIV/AIDS, globalization, indigenous knowledges and social action. In recognition of his dedication to community work on the university campus and outside of it, Mutamba has received awards in community organizing and student leadership from Trent University and the University of Toronto respectively. Since 2010, Mutamba has been working on building Ubuntu Learning Centre, an eco-village and village learning centre in Zimbabwe, which is dedicated to the recovery and preservation of life skills rooted in indigenous knowledge systems and spiritual ways. And he continues to grow from the learnings of those around him and the spirit that is the earth and those before him.
Prince Chidyagwai
Lafayette College '05
University of Pittsburgh, MA '08
Rice University, PhD '10
Dr. Prince Chidyagwai is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at Loyola University Maryland. Prince grew up in Marondera, Zimbabwe. Upon completion of his A-levels at Marondera High School he attended Lafayette College where he graduated with degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. He earned a masters degree in mathematics at the University of Pittsburgh and finished his Ph.D in Computational and Applied Mathematics at Rice University in 2010. Dr. Chidyagwai enjoys teaching and his research interests are in numerical methods of partial differential equations.
Bernard Matambo
Oberlin College '05
Brown University '07
Bernard Farai Matambo is an Assistant Professor in the Creative Writing Program at Oberlin College. He teaches courses in fiction, nonfiction, transitional prose forms as well as poetry and internationally-focused electives in Creative Writing. He received his BA from Oberlin College, OH, and an MFA from Brown University, RI, where his writing received both the Beth Lisa Feldman Award for Fiction and the Matthew Assatly Award from the Literary Arts Program. His work has been published in Prairie Schooner, Witness, Pleiades, AGNI, Cincinnati Review, The Journal, Laurel Review and plume poetry among others, and has been nominated for the Pushchart Prizes. He has received residency fellowships from The Blue Mountain Center and the I-Park Foundation and has served as visiting artist at the Delta Gallery in Harare, Zimbabwe. An excerpt from his novel was awarded the Walter Rumsey Marvin Grant (2013) by Ohioana Library, an award given to the most promising writer under 30. He is a 2015 finalist for the African Poetry Prize awarded by Brunel University, England. Bernard is a recent recipient of an international arts education grant from the Minneapolis Foundation to develop a course study of community arts and arts education in Zimbabwe.
Tafadzwa Muzhandu
Mount Holyoke College '05
Reading University, UK '09
Tafadzwa Muzhandu (Fadzie) is a mother (first time mum), activist and a social entrepreneur. She has been working in the non-profit sector for 8 years, focusing on girls' education, and more recently on children who have dropped out of school, trying to bring them back to the classroom. Fadzie is passionate about youth programs and second chance education. She is currently the coordinator for Non-Formal education activities at World Education, working with the ministry of education to try and prepare 40,000 children for reintegration into the formal school. She is the also the program coordinator for Tariro, a grassroots organization supporting young orphaned women to receive an education. She recently gave presentations at Mount Holyoke College, UMASS-Amherst and Amherst Community Radio, on the status of education in Zimbabwe. She considers herself an education activist advocating for inclusion of marginalized children and youth. She has work experience in South Asia, Africa and the US.
Fadzie graduated from Mount Holyoke College (MHC) in 2005 with a BA in Economics and International Relations. She went on to obtain an Msc. in Development Studies at the University of Reading, after receiving a Chevening Fellowship. She also spent a year at the University of Sussex as an exchange student.
Cato
The College of Wooster '05
Cato is an IT professional and entrepreneur based in Silver Spring, Maryland. From his base, Cato runs a number of websites and is in the process of creating the ultimate website that will most likely change way things run on the internet forever.
Cato was born in Buhera, a mountainous region in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. He is the only child in his family. He grew up in the suburb of Mbare in Harare where he attended Harare High School. Upon graduation from high school, Cato attended The College of Wooster in Ohio where he obtained a BA degree in Mathematics. While in college, he served as a member and or an officer in over twenty clubs and organizations through the four years which include the Black Students Association, South Asia Committee, International Students Association, Mathematics Club, and the Wooster Christian Fellowship.
Cato is extremely athletic and loves sports. Having grown up playing soccer and cricket, it was only natural that he would continue playing those sports at varsity level at Wooster. His tremendous passion for the sports and complete dedication to the success of the teams is still being talked about by the coaches at Wooster. During breaks from school and or when the soccer and cricket seasons were off-season, Cato was well known in the community as an enthusiastic ambassador of soccer and cricket. He considers the volunteer work he did outside of school as one of the most fulfilling activity he did in his life.
While in high school, Cato also picked up tennis. He taught himself how to play, mainly by watching the television and playing alone on the wall. However, when he got to Wooster, the challenging academic schedule and his involvement in the soccer and cricket teams unfortunately meant that tennis had to be relegated to the intramural level. Since graduation, tennis has however taken over as the top sport in his life. This summer, Cato will begin volunteer work as a tennis instructor in Silver Spring, MD where he resides.
Cato is presently based in Harare, Zimbabwe. When he is not online, Cato enjoys hanging out with his friends, playing tennis and soccer, hiking, watching movies, listening to music, and reading.
Rungano Nyambuya
Ithaca College '05
University of Virginia '06
Born and raised in Mutare, Zimbabwe Ru Nyambuya graduated from Ithaca College in 2005. While at Ithaca, she was one of the pioneering members of MAUYA - African Students Association. In 2004 she interned at Ernst & Young and is now a Senior in the Assurance practice at the firm. Ru completed her Ms in Accounting in 2006 from the University of Virginia. She enjoys watching movies and hopes to travel around the world a lot more.
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