YLSS: Developing a Development Scholarship

Created only four years ago, the Yousriya Loza-Sawiris Scholarship (YLSS) has involved decades of collaboration. Beginning with two colleagues’ efforts to help garbage collectors in Egypt, the YLSS embraces varied dreams for the country. The YLSS supports its scholars through a new type of master’s degree, seeking passion as much as academic achievement. If you want to improve life around you in a measured and intelligent way, the YLSS may be the program for you.

The Professor

It all started with the professor. From the age of sixteen, Ragui Assaad sought a career to advance economic and social development in his home country, Egypt. At first he thought nuclear engineering might be his tool for that, building reliable power. This idea “lasted about a year” in college, he laughs, “once I saw the complexities.”

Assaad stayed in engineering however, focused on solar power and energy for urban development. He graduated with degrees in physics and mechanical engineering from Stanford University before heading back to Egypt in 1981 to complete his military service requirement.

At that point, Assaad made another career shift. A chance encounter led to him being hired by Environmental Quality International (EQI). This new firm was consulting to improve garbage collection and recycling systems in Cairo, including worker living conditions, which Assaad describes as “appalling.”

Assaad stayed for two years, “completely immersed in on-the-ground development work at the community level.” He explains, “It brought together all aspects of development, social science aspects, not just science and technology….I was inspired to pursue a Ph.D. in urban and regional planning with a focus on development and a strong dose of economics.” After completing this doctorate at Cornell University, he continued into U.S. academia while still pursuing research and fieldwork in Egypt.

The Pioneer

Perhaps even more fateful than that study choice, at least for the future of YLSS, was a contact Assaad made in 1982 during his time with EQI. Yousriya Loza Sawiris was serving as the firm’s accountant, providing financial advice as she would in the future for a number of new community organizations. Assaad asked her if she could help build the skills of a garbage collecting community member who was doing the local bookkeeping. “That was her first involvement,” said Assaad. “I remember she had on fancy shoes and I had this jeep and drove her into the settlement. I said, ‘Please wait, I’ll help you get out.’ She said, ‘Oh, of course not, I can get out on my own.’ She opened the door and sank right into the garbage. There was decomposed waste and fires everywhere, quite a scene.”

Loza Sawiris has always referred to this moment as her “baptism into garbage.” She began learning more, got more involved, and eventually founded both her own garbage collection company, Enhancement of Integrated Services and Waste Recycling, and, earlier, an NGO, the Association for the Protection of the Environment (APE). Assaad serves on the board of APE and has continued to work with Loza Sawiris through the years.

“Today there are about 55,000 NGOs in Egypt,” says Noura Selim, Executive Director of the Sawiris Foundation for Social Development (SFSD). “They were not so popular back in the 1980s.” Loza Sawiris deserves recognition for “her tremendous work in development,” Selim continues. “She is one of the leading Egyptian pioneers especially in the recycling area and supporting the garbage collector communities….[Her NGO became active] supporting them economically, socially…in providing education for their children, healthcare….and to also protecting the environment since a big part of what they do impacts the environment. As part of Parliament she advocated for garbage collectors and other disadvantaged communities very passionately.”

Loza Sawiris has been centrally involved in establishing and supporting numerous NGOs. The SFSD is one such organization, founded in 2001. “The main mandate of this foundation is to provide high quality education to Egyptians, both in Egypt and abroad,” explains Selim. “Our philosophy tends to be to try to find programs not funded, at least not sufficiently, by other donor organizations” and that can strongly benefit Egypt. Today, the foundation funds sixteen scholarship programs at levels from vocational-technical training to master’s degrees and in a variety of fields from music to engineering and sciences, nursing to hospitality, “continually mapping” other fields in which there may be need.

The Minnesota MDP

Meanwhile in 2007 the U.S.-based MacArthur Foundation was also looking at educational needs, specifically those of international development professionals. They convened a high-level commission to explore the issue. “They brought together some pretty big names in the development field,” remembers Assaad, “to examine what would be ideal.”

The consensus was that “it was not expertise in any particular field,” Assaad continues, “there were enough experts in public health, experts in environmental areas, and so on.” What was needed to make sustainable development projects successful was to prepare “people who can integrate and cut across fields, think in an interdisciplinary way that transcends any one of these fields.” Development professionals needed to learn to communicate with subject-matter experts and apply varied knowledge.

Also important for the ideal development program would be “a strong experiential component.” Finally, preparatory programs would teach “multiple modes of inquiry, both quantitative and qualitative,” enabling graduates to “navigate different ways of knowing.”

The foundation then put out a request for proposals to create such programs, termed Master of Development Practice (MDP) programs. While the request primarily targeted universities in the global South, some other institutions applied as well, including the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Assaad was a professor there, teaching development as a concentration within the university’s public policy program. While the university did not win a grant, its self-exploration convinced administrators that an MDP degree could bring together strengths previously isolated in diverse departments: agriculture, public health, information technology, and many others. All would contribute to the new degree’s curriculum, under the umbrella of the Humphrey School of Public Policy. Formally established in 2010, the University of Minnesota MDP recently celebrated its tenth anniversary with a strong reputation and its own niche in the field.

Beyond being an interdisciplinary program, a key aspect of what makes an MDP unique is that “it is not an academic program,” says Assaad. “Most interdisciplinary studies are studies, focused on theories, literature. This is about training practitioners, the application of knowledge to action. It involves practical solutions to problems and work on the ground at a community level. That’s why the experiential component of the program is so important.”

The uniqueness of the Minnesota program, beyond the MDP practical orientation, “is that it also has a focus on sustainable livelihoods,” continues Assaad, “how marginalized, poor people are able to…support themselves and their families while also protecting the environment. There’s a strong connection between the economic side and the social side and the environmental side. There’s a very strong focus on social justice with a sustainable livelihood perspective. That’s really kind of the trademark of the Minnesota program.”

“It was the culmination of what I wanted to do all along,” says Assaad, “It was the ideal fit for me.”

Inspiration and Evaluation

Assaad brought up the idea of a new scholarship for MDP preparation to Loza Sawiris. “I said, ‘You’re complaining about not finding the right people for your development initiatives. What about setting up a scholarship to train them in an integrated way in development skills? She loved the idea. That was the start and it went on from there.”

Selection of the University of Minnesota as the scholarship site involved in-depth evaluation of program resources, content, and other factors deeper than climate. “Obviously it is too cold for Egyptians to go to Minnesota,” jokes Selim.

Two major points in the Minnesota program’s favor were that it covers content highly relevant to Egypt and that it demands focus on project evaluation. “It’s easy to feel good with whatever you do in development and at the end of the day feel you’re helpful and helping,” says Selim, “but it’s more than the intention.” She praises the University of Minnesota for “rigor” allowing its graduates “to properly manage a development project and understand that it is a project: there are metrics, there are KPIs [key performance indicators], to question the impact critically and work towards really improving the impact.”

Another factor in making the decision was Assaad’s involvement. “Having a faculty member like Dr. Ragui, not just that he’s Egyptian but that he still does active research in Egypt,” is quite valuable, Selim points out. “He can provide students with someone to go to and a sounding board as to how to apply [their learning] in the Egyptian context.”

More broadly, “We always look at the readiness of partner institutions for partnership,” comments Selim. “We care that the institutions we work with exhibit strong interest in having students from Egypt, seeing their potential, being open to partnership.”

In 2016, the SFSD opened the first round of competition for students to receive awards. Their new program was named the Yoza Loza Sawiris Scholarship as “the brain child of our chairperson,” says Selim, “even though she didn’t want it named after her.”

Become Part of the Story

Now the YLSS is in its sixth round, requesting applications. “We care very much that our outreach is strong and that we’re able to reach people all across Egypt,” says Selim. “Obviously this year is very tricky,” she continues. “We’re not sure how things are going to evolve,” but the foundation is committed to finding candidates that it can move forward with in supporting.

“I see development as a very complex field,” says Selim, dealing with such areas as “addressing poverty, reducing poverty, eliminating inadequate access to education….very big questions. Just being open to understanding the complexity and making your way through it and always being critical in the positive sense of critical, being serious” is key.

“We’re looking for people who are passionate about development,” adds Assaad, “not just those who are really good academically but those who have done something to show their commitment.” Ideally candidates would have one to three years of relevant work and/or volunteer experience, he says, but “it varies a lot.”

“Especially with people from Egypt, for example,” he adds. “We know that problems in development are surrounding them all the time so if they express consciousness and knowledge, even if they don’t have a lot of experience, that’s fine. We do want people who are committed to going back and working in the development field, who see this as more than another credential to add to their CV.”

Could this committed, passionate professional be you? Learn more about the application process now, and take your first step toward becoming part of the YLSS story.