Empowered to Empower

In this episode, Sydney Hunt ('23 cohort) and Ashley Yeh ('24 cohort) speak with Khushi Malde ('24 cohort) about her hopes for education to spark curiosity, build resilience, and empower students to innovate, create, and lead for global responsibility. Khushi shares how growing up and attending high school in Kenya and then pursuing an undergraduate degree at UC Berkeley made her realize the gap in opportunities that she had compared to her peers--and how doing work to bridge those gaps brings her joy. She talks about founding a nonprofit that brings entrepreneurship education to high school students across Sub-Saharan Africa and shares insights into her current work at Stanford, where she's building tools that help students explore potential career paths through hands-on, immersive learning.

Highlights from the episode:

(03:45) Khushi's journey from Kenya to UC Berkeley to Stanford and how it has influenced her work and academic path

(07:18) The gaps that Khushi is working to bridge and the point when she realized the gap in opportunities that she had compared to her Berkeley peers

(11:13) Why Khushi chose to pursue data science and business at Stanford

(17:33) Elaborating more on her decision to pursue nonprofit work in Africa, the journey of starting and running her nonprofit, and the work that her nonprofit is doing

(25:47) Khushi's plans and aspirations for the future as well as the project that she is currently working on at Stanford

(33:09) What Knight-Hennessy Scholars has meant to her work and her experience at Stanford

(37:43) Her experience at Immersion Weekend and why she considers it a highlight of her overall Knight-Hennessy Scholars experience

(39:44) Advice for those applying to Knight-Hennessy Scholars

(45:04) Improbable facts