Ajay Ajimobi – Equality, Diversity, & Inclusion Lead | Charity Director
Ajay Ajimobi is ranked UK’s 9th Most Outstanding Future Leader, an award-winning diversity & inclusion champion, education activist, public speaker, and board member.
As an authentic, values-oriented leader, Ajay is excited by opportunities that help others achieve their potential. Amalgamating her passion for social justice and fair access and progression in higher education, Ajay is Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Lead in the public sector and Director at the Cowrie Scholarship Foundation. The charity provides mentoring and full university scholarships for disadvantaged Black British students.
Ajay has extensive experience in cultivating meaningful change in the higher education sector having undertaken numerous leadership roles. For example, as a former member of a high-profile national committee at the Office for Students, Ajay assessed and rated Universities and colleges in England for excellence.
As the first ever Black female President, director & chair of Board of Trustees of a 16,000-strong membership-led charity with c. £1.2m annual expenditure, Ajay has a proven record as an engaging inspirational leader.
Prior to this, Ajay was the first female Vice-President Voice at the University of Surrey Students Union. In this capacity she led an internal awarding gap research project and produced a BAME Student Experience Report to tackle the BAME awarding gap.
Consequently, there was a reduction in Surrey’s BAME awarding gap from 26% to 12% by the end of her term and the findings and recommendations of her report remain integrated into the University’s BAME Awarding Gap Action Plan.
In recognition of her unwavering dedication to improving the experience of Surrey students and successfully developing numerous EDI initiatives, Ajay was presented the University’s Award for Outstanding contribution to Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion and bestowed honorary membership of the Students’ Union.
Ajay is an exceptional public speaker and host with more than 10 years of experience, her area of expertise includes but are not limited to:
Education
Leadership
Equality, Diversity & Inclusion
Adversity and resilience