Sekeyian Yiaiile, Founder and Executive Director
Sekeyian Yiaile grew up in a Maasai village and attended primary school in the Talek region of the Maasai Mara. In her personal essay, Ms. Yiaile describes a lifelong commitment to female literacy and women’s empowerment. A community leader and an outstanding woman of integrity, Ms Yiaile overcame great challenges to become one of the most educated women in Maasailand. In a community that has not given women’s education the same status as that of men, Ms. Yiaile challenged the community’s tradition of early marriages and instead pursued education. Ms. Yiaile completed secondary school in Maasailand, Kenya and holds a Diploma in Business Administration from Kenya Institute of Management (KIM). In 2005, she joined LeMoyne Owen College in Memphis, Tennessee (USA), where she graduated in 2006 with a BA in Business Administration. She has completed coursework for her MA program from Prescott College and is working on her thesis on sustainable development.
In 2007, Ms. Yiaile realized her vision for empowering Maasai women when she founded MCI in 2007 with a single school feeding program at Enkongu Narok Village School in the Amboseli National Park, and has overseen its growth into an organization with an annual budget serving seven programs and four different schools. Today, she oversees the operations of MCI and the Fred Baron School.