Ambassador Spotlight: August 2025

One Young World Ambassadors are leading projects in every country of the world, creating substantial social impact across all 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Every month our Coordinating Ambassadors select someone from their region who has created significant social impact locally, regionally or even worldwide.

This Month's Projects in Numbers

174 k+

Students Provided Health Education

150

Grants Distributed

Climatize

Meet the Ambassadors

Atika

She/Her

Atika Juristia - Canada

Atika is the founder of The J Healthcare Initiative, a nonprofit tackling the toxic drug crisis by affirming the healthcare choices of substance users. The organisation combines collaborative experiential learning with data-driven insights to close the gap between evidence-based policy and real-world implementation. The J Healthcare Initiative instituted the first drug user health promotion circle in Canada and the United States and played a pivotal role in landmark policy wins, including bringing "harm reduction" into UN resolutions and advancing innovative medical treatments for addiction.

Her work has reached over 174,000 college students, created more than 10,000 hours of student-led health promotion projects, and helped shift policies that now affect seven million Canadians. In recognition of her impact, Atika was named one of BC Business's 30 Under 30 in 2025. Atika is also part of the Broadbent Institute's 2025 Emerging Leaders cohort and serves in an advisory role at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, focusing on substance use and schizophrenia and psychosis.

Jan

He/Him

Jan Peloza - Slovenia

Jan is the leader of the Impact Launchpad, an incubation programme by Impact Hub Slovenia that empowers young people to create sustainable impact ventures by guiding them through the early stages of building their initiatives. The programme helps participants refine their vision, identify social or environmental problems to address, design solutions, and test them with a target audience. Designed as an entry point into social innovation, the programme also provides aspiring entrepreneurs with structured support, mentorship, and access to a community of peers and experts.

Since its launch, Impact Launchpad and Impact Hub Slovenia supported over 150 young people in starting over 40 social and environmental projects. It has also facilitated the development of 25 prototypes, several of which have moved into long-term implementation or scaling. After completing the programme, many participants join international networks or continue their work through incubators and accelerators

Manal Makkieh

She/Her

Manal Makkieh - Lebanon

Manal is the Founder and Director of the Kayani Project, an initiative to combat the injustices facing refugee women in Lebanon through education, mental health support, and vocational training. The organisation focuses their work in the Mar Elias camp, where Manal was born and raised, and became driven to develop long lasting solutions to social and legal marginalisation that go beyond providing temporary aid.

The work of the Kayani Project has reached over 500 women, over 300 of whom have achieved economic independence and social agency within their communities. Additional programmes such as literacy workshops and storytelling initiatives have reached countless other refugees and amplified their voices to local and global audiences. Proudly youth-led, the Kayani Project remains “by refugee women, for refugee women.”
 

Alba Forns

She/Her

Alba Forns - United States

Alba is the COO and Co-Founder of Climatize, a climate fintech platform working to democratise the energy transition. Climatize allows everyone to invest in clean energy projects from just $10 while giving renewable energy developers a faster and more inclusive way to access finance.
Many community-scale projects struggle to secure funding, as traditional banks favour large-scale deals and often overlook smaller initiatives that deliver strong local benefits, including lower energy bills, greater climate resilience, and new jobs. Climatize bridges this gap by connecting everyday and mission-driven investors directly with these underfunded opportunities through a secure platform.

Since launching, Climatize has channelled nearly $10,000,000 into 22 energy infrastructure projects, including work with farmers in the Southern United States who are using solar power to provide communities in food deserts with access to affordable, nutritious produce and help families withstand extreme weather events.

Sharona Shnayder

She/Her

Sharona Shnayder - Israel

Sharona is the Founder of Tuesdays for Trash, an environmental movement that encourages people worldwide to collect trash in their local neighbourhoods each week. Participants then share their efforts with the hashtag #TuesdaysForTrash to spread awareness and encourage others to join the movement. In doing so, Sharona not only protects the natural world but also creates a simple and easy way to mobilise communities for a sustainable and trash-free future on the planet.

Tuesday for Trash has been active for five years and has mobilized individuals in over 60 countries to remove 100,000 pounds of litter from the environment. In addition to direct action, the movement has launched educational campaigns, events, and collaborated with schools, youth groups, small businesses, and policy groups to promote effective waste management on a local and international scale. Sharona also recently co-authored Journey to Away (journeytoaway.com), a book dedicated to helping future changemakers understand the concept of where our trash goes after we throw it away.

Dao Manh Nghia

He/Him

Dao Manh Nghia - Vietnam

Dao is the CEO of the DMN Foundation, an initiative that educates young people about the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), law, and other topics relevant to international affairs. They do this by creating a network of young leaders through a scholarship programme, leadership competition, and summit series and upskilling them to achieve their organisational goals.

Currently, over 500 people from 35 countries are in the DMN Foundation network. 120 of these network members have received financial support by means of grants to create or continue sustainable development projects. In addition to his work with the DMN Foundation, Dao is a published legal scholar with over 25 legal articles. His work with the DMN Foundation taught him that “when you truly commit to a bold vision, you grow into the person capable of achieving it.”

Viktor Gurskyi

He/Him

Viktor Gurskyi - Ukraine

Viktor is a Partner at 1991 Ventures, a seed fund focused on supporting mission-driven tech founders from Ukraine and other Eastern and Central European countries. The fund helps these founders enter a globally competitive market while reinforcing the UK as a key destination for international tech entrepreneurship. As a result, the fund creates jobs, increases company valuations, and contributes to both UK and Ukrainian economies.

One way that the fund helps startups navigate operating in the UK is through the UK-Ukraine Tech Bridge investment programme, a partnership between 1991 Ventures and the UK and Ukranian Government that brought 37 Ukrainian founders to the UK. Across two cohorts, these participants had over 400 hours of meetings with stakeholders and pitched their ideas at London Tech Week. This led to 18 startups raising over £10,000,000 in venture capital.
 

Naira Santa Rita Wayand

She/Her

Naira Santa Rita Wayand - Brazil

Naira is the Founder of the DuClima Institute, an organisation dedicated to confronting environmental racism, advancing just climate adaptation, and defending the rights of people displaced by extreme climate events. The Institute pursues this mission through education, political advocacy, consulting, lectures, workshops, and territorial mobilisation. The DuClima Institute centres the leadership of Black, Indigenous, Afro-Brazilian, peripheral, and other marginalised communities disproportionately affected by the climate crisis in Brazil.

Since its founding, the DuClima Institute has engaged with more than 20 territories across Brazil through training initiatives, community consultations, and climate adaptation projects grounded in social justice. The Institute also played a central role in drafting and advocating for Bill 1594/2024, introduced in Brazil’s National Congress, which proposes the country’s first national policy to protect people displaced by climate disasters. In addition, it contributed technical recommendations to the reform of Brazil’s federal housing program, ensuring priority for families impacted by extreme weather events and those living in high-risk areas.

 

Adilene Pérez Narciso

She/Her

Adilene Pérez Narciso - Mexico

Adilene has been an activist for youth and Indigenous rights since the age of nine and brings over 19 years of experience working with her community, the Mazatec people, in Oaxaca, Mexico. She has collaborated with more than 10 civil society organisations to design social projects and influence public policies and legislation related to youth.

She has been recognised with the National Atenea Award, as a Latin American Youth Ambassador for a World Free of Child Labor, and as former president of the Citizen Council for the Monitoring of Public Youth Policies of the Mexican Youth Institute. She has also been a fellow of the Pablo VI Foundation of Spain, among other distinctions. Her work is dedicated to advancing the recognition of youth and women’s rights, serving as a spokesperson across different spaces, engaging with peers, and building collaborative networks.

Alejandra Marín

She/Her

Alejandra Marín - Colombia

Alejandra is the Director of Sustainable Dreams at Volunteering Colombia, an organisation that promotes volunteerism nationwide by providing free training to foundations and non-profit organisations addressing the needs of their communities. This support is offered through monthly virtual and in-person meetings, with topics selected by the participating foundations.

To date, more than 100 organisations across Colombia have benefited from this training, covering subjects such as Anti-Racism in Volunteering, Child Safeguarding, and Mental Health in Volunteering. A total of 1,115 people from 100 registered foundations engaged in Volunteering Colombia’s programmes have attended these sessions, supporting volunteers that have contributed 9,200 hours of service.

Janeth Bonilla

She/Her

Janeth Bonilla - Ecuador

Janeth is the Co-Founder of the KISTH Foundation, a large network of Indigenous professionals in Ecuador that integrates science, technology, and the humanities with ancestral knowledge to develop innovative solutions addressing rural challenges and strengthening cultural resilience. The organisation is committed to the Sustainable Development Goals and focuses on four strategic pillars: quality education, gender equality, climate action, and digital transformation in rural communities.

Since its founding, KISTH has implemented programmes that promote STEM education, revitalise the Kichwa language, and support sustainable agriculture. These initiatives have directly reached more than 1,000 people through academic fairs, community workshops, scientific outreach, mentorship, digital skills scholarships, and leadership development programmes. Currently, the foundation is expanding digital education opportunities for Indigenous youth through educational tours. The impact of the KISTH Foundation in rural communities has been made possible thanks to strategic partnerships with universities and NGOs in Ecuador.

Learn more about the tireless work of One Young World Ambassadors and the outstanding impact of their social impact initiatives in August 2025.