Pestalozzi International is proud to announce funding for the next cohort of the Aspiring Conservation Leaders (ACL) Programme, run by the Chipembele Wildlife Education Trust in Zambia's South Luangwa Valley.
The programme was shaped and championed by Pestalozzi alumna Thandiwe Mweetwa, a National Geographic Explorer and one of Zambia's leading voices in community-based conservation. Drawing on her own Pestalozzi education, Thandiwe designed ACL around the Head, Heart and Hands framing that sits at the core of our pedagogy.
About the programme
ACL is a year-long pathway for school leavers from rural communities around South Luangwa National Park who have the potential to become conservation leaders for Zambia. It bridges the gap between secondary school and a career in conservation - a gap that, without targeted support, closes off the sector to most rural young people.
Trainees move through a structured curriculum that combines classroom learning, a field-based bush camp, participation in Chipembele's wider conservation education programmes, work experience placements with conservation organisations operating in the Luangwa landscape, and a week-long career development trip to Lusaka to meet national NGOs and visit universities offering conservation degrees.
Head, Heart and Hands in practice
Head: rigorous training in ecology, wildlife biology, conservation policy and the science of human-wildlife coexistence - the knowledge base that lets graduates hold their own with researchers, rangers and policymakers.
Heart: time in the field with mentors who model stewardship, ethics and the lived realities of communities living alongside lions, elephants and wild dogs - building the values and empathy that sustain a long career in conservation.
Hands: real work placements with conservation NGOs, hands-on involvement in Chipembele's education outreach to local schools, and practical fieldcraft - so graduates leave the programme already contributing to the landscape they will go on to protect.
Outcomes
ACL graduates go on to study conservation, ecology and environmental science at Zambian universities, to ranger and guide training, and into junior roles with conservation NGOs operating across the Luangwa and Kafue ecosystems. Several now teach in Chipembele's own classrooms, completing the loop and inspiring the next generation of rural learners.
Beyond individual careers, the programme is steadily building a pipeline of Zambian-led conservation leadership - a sector that has historically depended on expatriate expertise and that urgently needs local voices shaping how landscapes, species and communities are protected.
Why we are funding this
Backing ACL reflects two things we believe deeply: that the best programmes are designed by leaders who have lived the realities they address, and that our alumni are the most powerful multiplier of Pestalozzi's mission. Thandiwe's work shows what becomes possible when a Future Leaders graduate returns home, identifies a structural gap and builds the programme that closes it.
Funding the next cohort means more rural young people from the Luangwa Valley will get the chance to turn their love of the wild into a profession - and that Zambia's wildlife will have more of its own people standing guard over it.
