South African Dell Young Leader on a Mission to Represent, Empower and Serve

An Unlikely Journey

Walking the three miles to school through Pretoria’s impoverished Mamelodi township, Gadaffi Nkosi didn’t think much about higher education. He was more focused on day-to-day trade-offs like choosing whether to spend his limited funds on lunch or the bus ride to school. But Gadaffi’s uncle Zeph kept pushing him to think bigger. He wanted to make sure that the boy’s academic gifts weren’t wasted, and that his nephew didn’t succumb to the community’s post-apartheid legacy of poor education, high unemployment, or rampant crime and HIV/AIDS infection.

Today, Gadaffi is a second year student in law at the University of Cape Town, South Africa’s top ranked university. To get there, he charted an improbable course from his grandmother’s house to the southern United States and on to the University of Cape Town. His goal is to first practice law, then work overseas as a diplomat. In the end, he intends to use his broad experience to help redress the disparities in income and opportunity that permeate post-apartheid South Africa.

Bigger Ambitions

Throughout his childhood, Gadaffi was acutely aware of the long odds against him. Many classmates dropped out of school to seek jobs in construction or in supermarkets. Others did whatever it took to stave off hunger and manage life as the heads of households ravaged by the HIV/AIDS epidemic that has left nearly two million of South Africa’s children orphaned or otherwise vulnerable. Fatherless himself, Gadaffi lived, along with his mother and other relatives, in his grandmother’s house, supported in large part by her pension.

In spite of the chaos around him, Gadaffi maintained his focus on his studies and exceled in school. And one day, the boy’s views about his prospects shifted. He’d heard about an international youth leadership summit in London. He wanted to go, but he couldn’t figure out how. As he walked home from school that afternoon, he had a realization: Mamelodi and its poverty weren’t limiting him. Neither were funds. The reality, he decided, was that he was limiting himself, refusing to even try for bigger things.

So he set out on a path far more ambitious than his daily hike to school. He made a commitment to pursue every opportunity, no matter how far afield it might lead him. That decision kicked off his unlikely journey out of his township. He first travelled to London, where he attended the youth summit on scholarship. He then went to the United States, where scholarships enabled him to attend the Morehouse College Pre-Freshman Summer Program and the Piney Woods School outside Jackson, Mississippi, where he completed his junior and senior years in high school. “I don't know how Gadaffi came out of this,” his mother, Aletta Sibongile Nkosi, told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien on CNN’s “Inside Africa” in 2009. “Some of the kids at this age, they've been distraught by drugs and all those things.”

The Right Support

While in the U.S., Gadaffi graduated from high school and volunteered in hurricane-devastated communities in Mississippi. He considered continuing his education abroad. But ultimately, he opted to return to his native country, leaving behind the predictable dislocations of being a foreigner for the sometimes more surprising dislocations of university life closer to home. Today, Gadaffi is one of 25 scholars who are part of the inaugural class of the Dell Young Leaders Program at the University of Cape Town (UCT.) The five-year program offers comprehensive support including tuition, technology, psychological and social support, career mentorship, internships and work-readiness training to high-potential, historically disadvantaged students like Gadaffi.

On one level, the program’s goal is to help these individual students graduate and to get them started on lifelong career paths. On another, the goal is to level the playing field for all black South Africans, who represent 85 percent of the population, but who—almost two decades after the end of apartheid—still make up less than 10 percent of key professional areas. The Dell Young Leaders Program is expected to grow to 400 scholarships at multiple universities in South Africa by 2015. The full benefits of the program will be far-reaching, changing the lives of each scholar, and touching their families and the countless people they encounter throughout their lives.

The transition to UCT has been intense for Gadaffi, even though he arrived at university having already lived overseas. The academics are rigorous, and the social dynamics complex. But for all its intensity, UCT is well-equipped to provide Gadaffi and others like him with the support they need. An academic powerhouse, the institution is one of the few institutions of higher learning that allocates student housing based on financial need and distance from home. Moreover, the school’s Centre for Higher Education is a recognized authority on supporting high potential—and often under-prepared—students from historically disadvantaged groups.

Because Gadaffi’s family is still struggling, he feels both conflicted about his own good fortune and pressured to help his family. And as the first member of his family to attend university, he feels a tremendous burden to achieve top grades. “It’s tough to admit how hard or stressful things can get at school,” says Gadaffi. “But in many ways, the Dell Young Leaders Program has become that ideal family that I always wished for.” Through the foundation, Gadaffi has access to dedicated mentors and counselors to help him manage through the stress of balancing family obligations and academics.

When he was a child, Gadaffi felt defined by the limitations of birth, geography and finances. These days, dreaming big comes naturally. In the short term, his goals are to stay focused on his studies, and to cultivate and develop the interpersonal skills he’ll need to grow into the political leader he hopes to become. But he has already started giving back, founding a student organization to help disadvantaged high school students take advantage of the sort of educational opportunities he had.

Beyond that, Gadaffi has mapped out a clear career path. After graduation from UCT, he’ll put his law degree to work, first helping disadvantaged South Africans understand and defend their rights, and then advocating for them on broader international and political stages. And while he knows it’s a longshot, he hopes to one day have a chance to serve his countrymen from the ultimate podium—the presidency of his nation’s still nascent democracy. For the young man who, at 20, has already traveled from Mamelodi to London, Mississippi and Cape Town, everything seems possible.