Founder and President
Ashesi University
Patrick Gyimah Awuah Jr is the Founder and President of Ashesi University, a private, not-for-profit institution that in Ghana. He was educated at Swarthmore in 1985 and in 2001, Patrick, who was a Program Manager at Microsoft, returned to Ghana to found Ashesi University. He holds Bachelor degrees in Engineering and Economics from Swarthmore College; an MBA from UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business; and honorary doctorates from Swarthmore College, Babson College, University of Waterloo and Connecticut College.
Patrick has won many awards including the Order of the Volta by His Excellency, President J.A. Kufuor, the Elise and Walter A. Haas International Award, an Elon Medal for Entrepreneurial Leadership, the McNulty Prize, and the MacArthur Fellowship and named one the 50 greatest leaders in the world by Fortune Magazine. Patrick was recognized by Africa Leadership Initiative – West Africa (ALIWA) as a “Genius Fellow” an honour reserved for only 20 people around the world. The Qatar Foundation named Patrick the 2017 WISE Prize for Education Laureate. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) named Patrick to a new 16-member International Commission as part of UNESCO’s Futures of Education initiative. He is a Fellow of the Africa Leadership Initiative; a member of the Council on Foreign Relations; and a member of the Tau Beta Pi honor society for excellence in engineering.