Each year, professionals from higher learning institutions are able to nominate talented students for the ECHO Award. The ECHO Award is an initiative of ECHO, Expertise Centre for Diversity Policy that honors students of color in higher education and young professionals for their outstanding efforts and work that contribute to the advancement of Diversity and Inclusion. The prize creates opportunities for students to achieve an equal starting position and contributes to a dialogue that recognizes societal challenges and illustrates the power of diversity.

When the ECHO Award was first presented more than 20 years ago, diversity was still a new theme. Stories of students with a non-western background* were hardly visible and the social debate was mainly focused on problems of diversity. Meanwhile, Diversity & Inclusion has become mainstream and the current generation of students is creating more and more space to discuss topics such as institutional racism. For the ECHO Award 2023, the jury is therefore looking for candidates who can make the next step in the social debate and will actively take their role as ECHO Ambassador.

The winners will be rewarded with a fully catered Summercourse at UCLA in the United States in 2024. They are chosen by an independent jury chaired by Kathleen Ferrier, Chair of the Dutch UNESCO Commission.

*ECHO is aware of the changing context regarding the term ‘non-western’. Click here for additional information on ECHO’s definition of non-western.