The Sheila and Robert Challey Institute for Global Innovation and Growth at NDSU is scheduled to host a presentation by serial entrepreneur Magatte Wade at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 4 p.m. in the Louise S. Barry Auditorium at NDSU’s Richard H. Barry Hall. The talk will be followed by a reception with light hors d’oeuvres at 5:30 p.m.
The event, titled “The Heart of the Cheetah: Entrepreneurship and Prosperity in Africa,” is free and open to the public. Virtual attendance is available on Zoom.
Wade is a visionary business leader with a passion for creating positive change in Africa. She is the founder and CEO of SkinIsSkin.com and is dedicated to reducing discrimination while creating jobs and prosperity in her home country of Senegal. Throughout her career, she has created successful high-end retail brands inspired by diverse African traditions.
Wade believes prosperity for Africans is one of the greatest moral causes of our time. She is passionate about the “cheetah generation,” a new cohort of dynamic African entrepreneurs and professionals, and the role of enterprise in overcoming poverty.
“I couldn’t be more thrilled to have Magatte Wade visiting NDSU. Her passion and enthusiasm for lifting people out of poverty is contagious,” said John Bitzan, Menard Family Director of the Challey Institute. “It’s a message that fits perfectly into what we are trying to do at the Challey Institute.”
Wade has been named a Forbes “20 Youngest Power Women in Africa”, a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum at Davos, a TED Global Africa Fellow, and a "Leading Woman in Wellness” by the Global Wellness Summit. She serves as director of the Atlas Network’s Center for African Prosperity and on the advisory board of the Whole Planet Foundation of Whole Foods Market.
The presentation is part of the Menard Family Distinguished Speaker Series. The series invites world thought leaders to share their ideas with the NDSU community on big questions that explore ways to improve the human condition and create economic opportunity.
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