Awarded 2016 Professional Fellows Alumni Impact Award

May 20, 2016

Doudly Elius
Alumni Engagement Innovation Fund 2014 First Haitian Winner
Founder and General Secretary of the Empower Haitian Women Organization
First Haitian Awarded 2016 Professional Fellows Alumni Impact Award

The U.S. Department of State's Professional Fellows Program announced this week that Doudly Elius is one of four recipients of the spring 2016 Alumni Impact Award (AIA). The award is given to alumni of Professional Fellows programs who continue to make significant impact on their communities after participation in the program. Doudly has been honored for outstanding achievement in founding and directing the Empower Haitian Women organization. Empower Haitian Women's work has included the creation of initiatives to provide business skills training and support to one of Haiti's most vulnerable and underserved populations: women living with disabilities.

Doudly participated in a fellowship with the Small Business Development Center at Rutgers State University through Partners of the Americas and also highly supported by NJ-Haiti Partners Chapter, an organization branch of Partners. This organization supported him while he was in NEw Jersey for his Fellowship. Following his participation in the Professional Fellows Program more precisely the Legislative Fellowship Program, Doudly obtained a grant for a community project to deliver business training to people living with disabilities as well as Training of Trainers sessions for senior business students. Building on this work, his Empower Haitian Women project won the Alumni Engagement Innovation Fund grant competition 2014. His team trained 40 disabled women in Port-au-Prince on business planning, communication and leadership. Doudly and the Empower Haitian Women team are currently engaged in work to further develop and expand business skills education training programs for women living with disabilities both within and outside Port-au-Prince. Speaking on the award, Doudly noted that the AIA (Alumni Impact Award) will provide him with greater opportunity to connect his community to appropriate resources and a larger platform to discuss Empower Haitian Women.

As part of the award, Doudly will attend the Spring Professional Fellows Congress in Washington D.C from May 31 to June 2, 2016 to discuss his work and connect with other international fellows. He will also make presentations on Professional Fellows Perspectives: Challenges and Opportunities ahead and also he will be an active participant to more than 266 International Fellows at the American Congress.


Written by : Anastazyia Vareschi
Empower Haitian Women Communication Manager
Fulbright English Teaching Assistant

United States