Watts Up Magazine wattsup magazine online | Page 45

WOMEN IN ENERGY AWARDS
A lot of what Martha does has to do with what she has come
up against in life. As an intern at Mumias Sugar Company, she
gained experience in generating AC power from a renewable
source and the maintenance of distribution and transmission
systems. This same experience informed her research topic in
fifth year at the university.
Through the programme, Wakoli
has reached 10 secondary
schools (both boys and girls) as
an ambassador and she hopes
to reach more this year.
After graduation, Wakoli landed her first job with Rift Valley
Railways, a position that took her outside of Nairobi to rural
Kenya where she supervised transportation of cargo.
“While working, I noticed many loopholes in the energy sector
and the urge to do something was overwhelming. That is
why I quit my job to go work as a graduate intern at Virunga
Power with a hope to find solutions to some of the challenges I
observed in the energy sector,” she says.
As an intern. Martha got a chance to participate in a World Bank
competition aimed at eradicating poverty.
“With my working experience, I submitted my application,
with a report detailing how to increase energy access in the
rural areas,” she recounted. “That won me an award and with
the recognition that came with the win, an organisation called
Akili Dada got in touch. ‘‘They asked if I was willing to join their
Secondary School Mentorship Programme – a challenge I took
up with gusto.”
Through the programme, Wakoli has reached 10 secondary
schools (both girls and boys) as an ambassador and she hopes
to reach more this year. To reach out to more young women,
she has just launched a free online publication/magazine
called ‘Queengineers’. The publication celebrates women
in engineering with the hope of demystifying the field and
encouraging more girls to join the profession.
Virunga power station staff
Martha says that the publication hopes to address one critical
challenge to mentoring – a shortage of visible women role
models in the energy sector. The publication also subtly sets
out to change the internalised social mindset of the younger
generation that only boys are meant to fix things while girls are
meant to take care of people.
Martha Wakoli, who looks up to her parents and family for
inspiration, urges young ladies to look beyond the search for
money and fame to impacting communities and lives of people
around them
They asked if I was willing to join
their Secondary School Mentorship
Programme – a challenge I took up
Appreciation Speech
with gusto
WATTS UP MAGAZINE APR - MAY 2017
45