Lisandra Kabagenyi (Lisa), 25, lived with her mother, a single mother who struggled to take care of her and her 3 siblings. Her father abandoned them in a rented house in a Kampala slum. “Knowing that my mother could not afford to pay for my university education, I looked up for scholarships. There is no single lead that I did not follow but all in vain. I had lost all hope until the opportunity came through the Brian Mutebi Dream Scholarship Fund. I have never been so excited,” Lisa said. In 2015, Lisa, a GBV survivor, was the first university recipient of the Brian Mutebi Dream scholarship. In January 2020, she graduated from Makerere University with a Bachelor of Laws. She wants to defend poor women in courts of law.

The World Bank estimates that Uganda could save up to USD3 billion by 2030 if child marriages were eliminated, and the country’s productivity would be much higher if girls delayed marriage to the 20s and acquired a skill and worked.