Barbara Birungi Mutabazi

Barbara Birungi Mutabazi, is pursuing a Master in Education in Education Leadership, Organizations, and Entrepreneurship at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She holds an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Barbara has spent the past 15 years working to reduce poverty and advance gender equality by expanding economic and educational opportunities for young women and other underserved young people. Her commitment is personal. Growing up in Uganda, she saw how access to education can change a young woman’s trajectory, and she has built her career creating pathways for those who might otherwise be excluded from education, technology, and economic advancement.

Barbara is the founder of Women in Technology Uganda (WITU), which helps young women build skills and achieve economic independence. Through WITU, she is advancing ElevateHer360, a program preparing young women for the digital and AI economy. The program combines digital and AI skills, communication, entrepreneurship, financial literacy, mentorship, and connections to employers and digital work opportunities, helping participants turn learning into sustainable livelihoods. WITU’s programs have reached more

than 20,000 women across Uganda, providing Barbara with a strong foundation for understanding how education and workforce programs can translate into economic opportunity at scale.

As a SICI Fellow, Barbara is strengthening ElevateHer360’s pathways into emerging AI-enabled careers and developing an evidence-based model that can scale across growth markets. Her goal is to ensure that young African women are not left behind as AI reshapes the future of work, but are equipped to participate in and shape it. Barbara previously co-founded Hive Colab, one of Uganda’s first technology innovation hubs. Across her career, she has built partnerships spanning government, industry, and the international development sector to expand opportunities for entrepreneurs and young people.