GPP Student Stories - Blum Center

The GPP class of 2025 (Photo by Amy Sullivan)

GPP’s Class of 2025 Driven by Compassion, Connection, and Humanity

As this year’s Global Poverty and Practice (GPP) graduates stepped onto the stage to receive their diplomas, they carried with them a hard-earned insight: the injustices they spent years studying weren’t distant or theoretical — they were urgent and unfolding all around them. Their time in the program has prepared them to enter the world beyond Berkeley with a strong sense of purpose, ready to confront poverty in a time of growing global uncertainty.

AgriSolar’s Winning Pitch Earns $20,000 to Fund their Big Idea

AgriSolar — a mobile and scalable solar-powered irrigation system designed for smallholder farmers’ accessibility and affordability — took home top honors and the first-ever Biggie trophy in the 12th annual Big Ideas Grand Prize Pitch Day on May 7.

Ekta Raghuwanshi and Maria Denna with their students in Kasigau (Photo by Denna).

UC Berkeley Development Engineering Students Team Up with ABE Club to Strengthen Education in Kasigau, Kenya

Ekta Raghuwanshi and Maria Denna, her MDevEng classmate, worked at A Better Education Club as part of an internship pilot program that DevEng and ABE Club look to expand in the coming years. The organization, based in Kenya’s southwestern region of Kasigau, supports youth education and women’s empowerment by focusing on health, food security, hygiene, and farming practices.

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Visualizing Impact: DevEng Photography Contest Winners Showcase Work and Community

Every summer, UC Berkeley’s Development Engineering students create global social impact. The 2024 DevEng Photography Contest showcased their work, highlighting projects from digital education in Kenya to climate justice in Nigeria. Winning submissions emphasized human-centered technology, community-driven financial practices, and sustainable development, capturing innovation and resilience through powerful visual storytelling.

Master of Development Engineering Graduates 2024 Cohort

At Berkeley’s 2024 Master of Development Engineering commencement, graduates like Tilti Thind and Excellence Joshua celebrated transformative journeys. Their capstone projects and unwavering commitment embodied Berkeley’s spirit of radical change. Amid challenges and sacrifices, they emerged as determined changemakers ready to address global inequality and build sustainable, equitable futures worldwide.

Thank you, President Carter

We celebrate the life of Jimmy Carter, 39th President of the United States, and send condolences to his family and friends. As President, he advanced solutions to global conflicts, championed human rights, and promoted development. After the White House, he continued serving the world through the Carter Center’s impactful initiatives.

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From AI to Social Justice, MDevEng Class of 2025 Sets Sights on Global Problem Solving

Mingxi Tang, inspired by UC Berkeley’s Master of Development Engineering (MDevEng) program, shifted her career path from finance to social impact. Now part of the 2025 cohort, she aims to use AI and machine learning to improve the lives of people with disabilities.

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How a Berkeley alum and a Climate Action Fellowship partner fight for a sustainable future through human-centered engineering

Kevin Kung, co-founder of Takachar, began his climate innovation journey at UC Berkeley’s Blum Center through the 2015 Big Ideas Contest. Now hosting California Climate Action Fellows, Takachar helps transform agricultural waste into bioproducts, emphasizing a human-centered approach that addresses environmental challenges and supports underserved communities.

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Geographer Ross Doll Joins GPP Program

We are thrilled to welcome Dr. Doll as our new lecturer for GPP 115. This course serves students all across campus, introducing them to historical and contemporary debates on addressing poverty and inequality in the world. Dr. Doll’s extensive experience in the disciplines of critical development studies, political ecology, and cultural geography will bring a valuable perspective to this course.

A group of 14 diverse students stands on a staircase, posing for a graduation photo. The students are smiling and wearing graduation stoles with "BERKELEY" and "CLASS OF 2024" written on them. The group includes individuals in various styles of formal attire, with some wearing leis. The background shows an outdoor setting with trees and a building with large windows.

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“The Best of UC Berkeley”: GPP Minor Graduates Its 17th Class

Last month, the Global Poverty and Practice minor’s Class of 2024 celebrated a hard-earned and well-deserved commencement with an intimate ceremony in Sutardja Dai Hall’s Banatao Auditorium.

A group of 13 people including Soliver Ché Fusi.

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Blum Center Students and Faculty Take Up the Mantle of the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development

Soliver Ché Fusi is an environmental engineering PhD candidate at UC Berkeley. She hurries online to speak with me late in the Kenyan evening about her work at the Blum Center for Developing Economies. She’s telling me how the technology she’s working on hits on all these target issues — and it’s simple: sustainable agricultural fertilizer.

ChenTalk: Berkeley and UCSF Professor Irene Chen speaks to students in class white pointing at presentation during DevEng 203 and DevEng 210.

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Digital Transformation of Development Traineeship Brings AI and Data Analytics to Under-Resourced Settings

Under a new NSF-funded research program housed at the Blum Center, the Digital Transformation of Development (DToD) Traineeship, students are using their research skills to apply digital tools, such as machine learning and AI, to the issues and challenges of poverty alleviation, disaster relief, and more — in pursuit of digital and technological justice, equity, and empowerment.

Students and instructors of Fall 2023's DevEng C200 class all posing for a class photo

DevEng Team Creates Toolkit for Decision-Makers Aiding ‘Doubly Vulnerable’ Populations

“FireTools,” developed in DevEng C200, “Design, Evaluate, and Scale Development Technologies,” brings a wide array of resources under one umbrella for local decision-makers to use to improve disaster preparedness, response, recovery, and resilience — with a particular emphasis on doubly vulnerable communities.

Five members of the MDevEng community sport SHE 4 Change colorful clothing with bold patterns.

Patricia Quaye: Empowering Rural Women and African Culture Through Fashion

SHE uses sustainable fashion design to empower talented rural women to break free from generational cycles of poverty while promoting rich African heritages to the world. The project helps women with years of skilled seamstressing experience who find themselves disregarded or deemed incapable due to the rural environment and a male-dominated society.

A large group of graduates poses for a photo on stage. They are all dressed in black graduation gowns and caps.

Master of Development Engineering Graduates Second-Ever Cohort

Yordanos Degu Zewdu’s journey to becoming a changemaker began as a child in Addis Ababa, inspired by a moment of compassion from her mother. At UC Berkeley’s Development Engineering graduation, she urged classmates to embrace resilience and unpredictability, fueling hope for a more just, equitable world.

A young boy is walking along a dirt path in a rural area, carrying a bundle of plants. He is dressed in a casual outfit, including a blue jacket, beige shorts, and barefoot. The path is uneven and dusty, with a wooden pole and some makeshift wiring overhead.

DevEng Photo Contest Winners Highlight Both the Promise and Fragility of Technological Interventions

Joyce Kisiagani, with the help of another person, holds up their prototype of blue water filtration device (an affordable chlorination device that allows under-resourced communities to disinfect water at the point of collection) while giving a presenattion.

A Stream of Solutions: Highlights from the Annual Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Symposium at the Blum Center

Water, sanitation, and hygiene are crucial pillars of public health initiatives and in the fight against poverty. Issues like inadequate water access and poor sanitation disproportionately affect under-resourced communities, leading to waterborne diseases and socioeconomic impacts within vulnerable populations. Solutions are interdisciplinary, blending research findings and policy interventions in pursuit of infrastructure development, with communities’ contexts and needs at the core of WASH efforts.

A lively networking event where people are engaged in conversations.

Student Entrepreneurs Find Collaborators, Inspiration, and Opportunities at Innovators@Cal

Innovators@Cal — UC Berkeley’s annual flagship entrepreneurship event, which brought together aspiring student innovators, students curious about joining early-stage ventures, and an inspirational keynote speaker tackling the “world’s dumbest problem.”

A community outreach event focused on empowering girls and women in Africa. A woman in a pink shirt addresses girls in white uniforms, while another woman with a microphone engages them in discussion. The event promotes education and aims to end poverty for girls and women in Africa.

For the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, a Look at Blum Center Students Working to Alleviate Poverty

October 17 marked the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, a UN observance to uplift the voices of those in poverty. Aligned with this mission, UC Berkeley’s Blum Center offers programs like the Global Poverty & Practice minor, Master of Development Engineering, Big Ideas Contest, and Health Tech CoLab, giving students hands-on experience in addressing poverty’s root causes globally.

Meet Pun Praphanphoj: MDevEng Student and Prototype Engineer for Sustainable Solutions

Passion has led Praphanphoj to join the Master of Development Engineering program at UC Berkeley, where he focuses on sustainable design innovations. In his third and final semester now, he says he has enjoyed learning global development history and issues.

A group of eight individuals, wearing green and blue work jackets, proudly display sheets of recycled material. They are standing outside a recycling facility, with bags of sorted plastic bottles visible in the background. The diverse group, consisting of both men and women, smiles at the camera.

UC Berkeley’s Big Ideas Contest Builds Student-Led Social Innovations

Paige Balcom, the co-founder, co-CEO and CTO of Takataka Plastics, is changing Uganda — one plastic bottle at a time.

Global Poverty & Practice Minor

Student Stories

GPP’s Class of 2025 Driven by Compassion, Connection, and Humanity

AgriSolar’s Winning Pitch Earns $20,000 to Fund their Big Idea

UC Berkeley Development Engineering Students Team Up with ABE Club to Strengthen Education in Kasigau, Kenya

Visualizing Impact: DevEng Photography Contest Winners Showcase Work and Community

Master of Development Engineering Graduates 2024 Cohort

Thank you, President Carter

From AI to Social Justice, MDevEng Class of 2025 Sets Sights on Global Problem Solving

How a Berkeley alum and a Climate Action Fellowship partner fight for a sustainable future through human-centered engineering

Geographer Ross Doll Joins GPP Program

“The Best of UC Berkeley”: GPP Minor Graduates Its 17th Class

Blum Center Students and Faculty Take Up the Mantle of the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development

Digital Transformation of Development Traineeship Brings AI and Data Analytics to Under-Resourced Settings

DevEng Team Creates Toolkit for Decision-Makers Aiding ‘Doubly Vulnerable’ Populations

Patricia Quaye: Empowering Rural Women and African Culture Through Fashion

Master of Development Engineering Graduates Second-Ever Cohort

DevEng Photo Contest Winners Highlight Both the Promise and Fragility of Technological Interventions

A Stream of Solutions: Highlights from the Annual Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Symposium at the Blum Center

Student Entrepreneurs Find Collaborators, Inspiration, and Opportunities at Innovators@Cal

For the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, a Look at Blum Center Students Working to Alleviate Poverty

Meet Pun Praphanphoj: MDevEng Student and Prototype Engineer for Sustainable Solutions

UC Berkeley’s Big Ideas Contest Builds Student-Led Social Innovations

Host and Fellow Responsibilities

Host Organizations

Berkeley Program Director

Student Fellows

Global Poverty & Practice Minor

Student Stories

Host and Fellow Responsibilities

Host Organizations

Berkeley Program Director​

Student Fellows

Berkeley Program Director