Makerere University in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation has enabled 1,032 academically bright but economically disadvantaged youth from Africa to study at Makerere University from 2014 to 2024. The goal of the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program is to educate and empower the next generation of African leaders.
To date the Scholars Program has graduated 496 Scholars. The fifth cohort of about 300 Scholars are expected to graduate in February 2023. This will bring the total to 796 graduates of the Scholars Program.
As the Scholars Program alumni transition to either employment, further education, or entrepreneurship, the Scholars Program endeavored to support them by promoting the alumni as professionals to industry or potential employers. This led to the introduction of an e-portfolio platform. An E-portfolio is a digital space that holds evidence of educational and/or professional achievements, as well as reflective writing about the individual’s experiences. A well-designed portfolio would be useful to showcase an individual’s learning in a course or work placement, and it can also be used as employment documentation during job searches or promotion procedures. The Scholars Program E-portfolio platform tells the story of the Scholars accomplishments, skills and continued learning and paint a bigger picture of the skills and qualifications for potential employers.
The Scholars Program E-portfolio platform is primarily a work search and career portfolio. As a work search portfolio platform, it offers potential employers an opportunity to scan through Scholars profiles, to assess and select potential employees according to the requisite skills and competencies needed by the employer. The platform is also used when employers are considering a particular Scholar for promotion or a new position.