Joel Kawanguzi is a Coordinator at the Charitable Disability Organisation (CDO). He plays an important role in implementing the network’s programs and monitoring their success across Uganda.

Through his position at at CDO and work with the National Union of Persons with Disabilities (NUDIPU), Joel has experience in monitoring and strengthening a diverse array of disability employment projects and is keen to learn best practices in the U.S. that he can share directly with people with disabilities who want to become entrepreneurs. Prior to his position at NUDIPU, Joel was a Research Assistant at the USAID/Uganda Private Health Support Programme and a Research Officer at the Institute for Global Health at University College London.

Joel developed a project that supported adolescent girls and young women with disabilities out of school by teaching them marketing and business skills they can apply as small entrepreneurs selling local products. He is a person with a disability himself (scoliosis) and applies his lived experience to his advocacy for inclusion.

Joel spent his Fellowship at the University of Illinois Chicago Institute for Disability and Human Development.