RWSN’s Mentoring Programme

As part of the long-term collaboration between SDC and the Rural Water Supply Network (RWSN), the network launched a Young Professional Engagement Strategy in mid-2018, which has four pillars:

1. Community Building: an online community has been built from scratch to nearly 600 members in 91 countries who are actively supporting each other and sharing ideas and opportunities. If you are under 35, you can join here.
2. Mentoring: A stand-out success has been the RWSN's mentoring programme. In 2019, there were over 400 participants and a similar number are participating this year.SDC's financial support has been complemented with sponsorship by World Vision International. While not open at the moment, for future rounds women in mid-career (30+) and senior positions who would be interested in mentoring early-career (or mid-career) women will be highly welcome. Please contact the RWSN Secretariat if interested. To get an idea of what it is about watch the recording of this webinar or this video.
3. Young Professionals representation and voice: last year, 11 of the 15 RWSN webinars had at least one young professional as a speaker, and a similar proportion is targeted in 2020. The RWSN is always looking for engaged, young speakers for topics on rural water and rural WASH. The RWSN Director, Sean Furey, has made his contribution to judging this year's Ton Schouten Award for WASH Storytelling. Ton was the Chair of RWSN when he unexpectedly passed away in 2016.
4. Young Professionals events: Last year the RWSN ran an open Young Professional competition and the winner, Benson Kandeh from Sierra Leone, was supported to attend the 2019 World Water Week in Stockholm. You can follow him on Twitter @KandehBenson to see how he is developing and marketing low-cost rural water and hygiene solutions to tackle COVID-19, among others.

If you would like to know more about any of these issues, and other young professional partnerships and activities that the RWSN is involved with, please Meleesa Naughton of the RWSN secretariat.

^{Benson Kandeh, winner of the 2019 Young Professionals competition of the RWSN, with RWSN Young Professional Kenneth Alfaro Alvardo at SIWI 2019 in Stockholm}