A Q&A With Penn’s Newest Rhodes Scholar

Rutendo Chigora, a College senior from Harare, Zimbabwe, has been named one of the nation’s two recipients of a Rhodes Scholarship. She is the 22nd Penn undergraduate to be named a Rhodes Scholar since the fellowship began in 1904. The scholarships fund two or three years of study at Oxford University in England. 

Chigora is a Benjamin Franklin Scholar and Penn World Scholar pursuing a degree in international relations and political science, with concentrations in international development and political economy. She has conducted research on microfinance in Ghana, post-apartheid economic identities in South Africa, and the impact of social and economic remittances on African development. She founded ZW Connect, a business incubator that creates economic opportunities for vulnerable communities in Zimbabwe. ZW Connect was a social venture challenge winner at the 2014 Clinton Global Initiatives University Conference.

Chigora has served as vice president of Penn Mock Trial, associate editor for the Sigma Iota Rho Journal for International Relations, and a resident advisor in Riepe College House, and has been a member of the Penn International Mentorship Program and the College Cognoscenti. 

We asked her a few questions about her plans.

What will you study at Oxford?

I plan on taking up the Master of Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government. I am also considering the M.Phil. in Development Studies. After Oxford, I would like to gain some international experience in development and business while maintaining my ties to Zimbabwe through social impact work. None of this is set in stone—some of the most valuable advice I received a couple of weeks ago from Sarah-Jane Littleford (C’09) about being a Rhodes Scholar is to go in with an open mind, so I am excited to see where it all leads.

Can you describe the research you’ve done through Penn’s Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships? Did it lead you to create ZW Connect?

My first experience with research was when I went to Ghana on a Penn program. While a personal emergency precluded me from finishing the program in Ghana, I had the opportunity to spend my sophomore spring semester doing an independent study on data collection methods of microfinance institutions. This is what piqued my interest in issues of financial access in developing countries and thinking about ways to improve micro-credit initiatives. ZW Connect was a culmination of that and my research experiences spanning economic identities in post-apartheid South Africa, which illuminated for me how important access to resources is, and diasporic circuits, which also taught me about the different ways in which development and cultural trajectories are impacted by members of the Africa diaspora. I was also influenced by the political economy and international development-oriented courses I got to take. 

Tell me a little about ZW Connect. 

ZW Connect is an incubator for small businesses and income-generating projects in community centers and philanthropic organizations in Zimbabwe. We provide no-interest loans to these centers, as well project-support services through our network of Zimbabwean university students interested in public service and community development. We are focused on making these centers financially sustainable and less reliant on donor funding, and we are committed to activating youth leadership in our communities, which is why we are building a network of young people who help draft the business plans for these centers and manage our operations. 

I think one of the most important things for me about ZW Connect is that we are oriented around building a collaborative relationship with the centers we work with—we let them take the lead in deciding what kinds of projects they can and want to pursue, engage community members every step of the way, and equip them with the skills they need to run their projects so that our services become obsolete within a year of beginning our work with them.

What are your hopes and plans for the organization?

My plan is to add another city to our project portfolio by June of this year. We have been working in Harare for the last year and would like to work in a community center in Bulawayo, the country’s second capital, so we can gain as much experience and build a diverse network in several parts of the country. I am also hoping to spend my last few months in the U.S. working on getting more funding so we can increase our reach, and possibly transition to a paid rather than volunteer staff so we can contribute to solving youth employment problems in Zimbabwe. I am also really keen on growing our team to include more Zimbabweans abroad and at home, as well as any other people who are interested in development—so this is a shameless plug to get more Penn people involved!

Learn more about ZW Connect here.