Lelt Foundation is proud to award Tsion Worku this year’s Emily Giard Cabrera Scholarship! Tsion has been a gifted student since early childhood, and continues to score at the top of her class at Haramaya University in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. When Tsion was little, she lost her family and went to live at Kechene Orphanage in Addis Ababa. After she arrive at Kechene, Tsion began attending Tsehay Chora Elementary School, which is considered one of the finest public schools in the city. Despite the absence of her family and a general lack of social acceptance based on living in an orphanage, Tsion found support from her teachers and peers. She said, “at Tsehay Chora School, I had many close friends and great teachers. Mr. Netsanet was my math teacher, and he encouraged students to improve their grades with prizes for good exam results. His unorthodox teaching style was one of many things that inspired me to realize my potential and become a great, hard working student.”
Tsion left elementary school as one of the top students in the entire school, and continued to study hard and advance academically throughout middle school. She entered high school with a 4.0 GPA, and was one of only 100 girls in the country to be selected for an elite technology program called “African Girls Can Code”, in 2019. This advanced technology intensive seminar was held at the African Union for 15 days. It inspired Tsion to major in Computer Science when she entered college, and she now studies software engineering and coding at Haramaya University.
The Emily Giard Cabrera Scholarship is awarded annually to a bright young woman with great promise. Emily was a beloved counselor and mother who devoted her life to empowering girls to follow their dreams. Lelt is proud to support Tsion as the first recipient of this scholarship.