Ahmed Kura is the Country Director and Co-Founder of Kenya Drylands Education (KDEF) Fund, a non-profit organisation that strives to improve educational opportunities for underserved populations in the drylands of Kenya. Operating in an area of extreme poverty, which has an illiteracy rate of 90% and only 4% of classrooms are connected to water, he has partnered with local government and the leaders of the many long-neglected villages in the area to deliver crucial projects to transform education.

Through KDEF, Kura and his team are lifting up thousands of unschooled boys and girls through education. Kura has directed the building of nearly 100 classrooms, dormitories, and other vital infrastructure in an area facing a chronic shortage, as well as a mentorship programme sponsoring 217 high school students. Students develop skills in leadership, conflict resolution, stress and time management and educational and career-setting goals. They also learn about the effects of female genital mutilation, teenage pregnancy and early marriage, women’s empowerment and the role of men in facing these challenges. He is currently overseeing the construction of the first all-girls high school in the village of Loiyangalani.

Having grown up in the small village of Korr, in the drylands, Kura experienced
deprivation first-hand. He was orphaned at a young age and was able to complete high school only with the financial support of an American benefactor. He went on to earn a diploma in Information Technology at the School of Professional Study and later a degree in Development Studies at the Management University of Africa. Returning to the area of his birth, he made it his mission to make a difference in education.

Kura speaks 7 languages, allowing him to communicate effectively with the 17 tribes that inhabit the region he grew up in. To give itself a physical presence in the region, KDEF built its Centre for Excellence, and operational headquarters, in the village of Ngurunit in 2022. It includes offices for its growing staff, a large kitchen, a meeting area for several hundred people, a dormitory for at-risk high school students, a multi-use sports structure and the first-ever library in Northern Kenya.

Ahmed also developed a multi-faceted educational model he calls EnART: Enrollment, Attendance, Retention and Transition. It is designed to address the complex issues that make it so difficult for students in the drylands to obtain an
education.

Before KDEF, Omar founded BOMA Project, which focuses on lifting communities outof poverty through a women's economic empowerment programme.

In 2018, Ahmed was named an Aspen New Voices Fellow, chosen for his “proven
track record of implementing his ideas”. In 2021 he was chosen as one of 40
recipients of a Gratitude Fellowship, selected from over 1,000 applicants. Most
recently in 2023, he was presented with the Head of State Commendation by the
President of Kenya.