Ms. Beatrice Ayuru
Founder of Lira Integrated School
Ms. Ayuru founded the Lira Integrated School located in the Northern Region of Uganda in 2000. The second of six children, Beatrice Ayuru grew up in Lira, an underserved community in rural Uganda. She was the first female University graduate from her family and the first woman admitted to the University of Makerere. Beatrice had a strong vision of building a school on her own to combat illiteracy, eradicate poverty, and fight for girl child rights. So she began to grow and sell cassava. She then used the profits to buy and rent out wheelbarrows to local workers, reinvested her profits in a canteen, and then used those profits as collateral to build the Lira Integrated Nursery, Primary and Secondary School. The school is funded, in part, by agricultural and aquaculture ventures that teach entrepreneurship skills to students and members of the Lira community. The school provides nursery, primary, secondary, vocational, and agricultural educations to over 1,500 students. In 2010, Beatrice won UNCTAD´s Empretec Women in Business Award. In 2011, the U.S. awarded her Ugandan Woman of Courage in Education, and the Federation of Uganda Employers awarded her Employer of the Year. In 2012, Lira Integrated School was ranked by AFROEDUCARE as the only 3 star private schools within the district.