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Master's Student Honored with MAP Scholarship

Ekene "Kennie" Amaefule was awarded the first Owen G. Lee Scholarship by the UW Multicultural Alumni Partnership (MAP) at their annual Bridging the Gap breakfast in October. Amaefule is an Advanced Adult Care Nurse Practitioner student who works as a nurse at Harborview Medical Center, has three children, and has raised thousands of dollars to help children in her native Nigerian village with health and education needs. The new scholarship was established in memory of Owen G. Lee, first African American administrator in Seattle Public Schools whose wife, Vivien Lee, is a School of Nursing alum. Also present at this UW Alumni Association event were Professor Lois Price-Spratlen, author, and Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence, cover artist for Spratlen's new book, African American Registered Nurses in Seattle, which was an auction item.

MAP scholarship winner Amaefule in her village in eastern Nigeria where she was crowned honorary chief Ugochinyere I—An Eagle from Above—during a recent visit to celebrate the drilling of a well made possible by funds Amaefule has raised. The first woman ever to receive this honor, she wears traditional chieftain garb and says she "couldn't get used to everyone standing" when she walked into a room. Amaefule also supports the education of 25 village children and provides health instruction and donated drugs and other materials during her visits. She is currently raising funds to open a food bank and to establish a kidney dialysis center nearby with donated equipment.

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