Mouhamadou Hoyeck is a 4th year political science major and African Studies minor. Throughout his two years spent at the University of Florida as an undergraduate student, Mouhamadou has participated extensively in multiple extracurricular activities. He is currently one of the public relations directors of the African Student Union at UF. He says that joining this organization was a life changing experience since it gave him the opportunity to interact with people from different backgrounds and share ideas about the continent.
His most recent achievement was being accepted as a Center for African Studies Ambassador. This is a position that will allow him to get in touch with many undergraduate students during the Spring semester and encourage them to take courses offered by the Center for African studies. Â Â Academically, Mouhamadou took many interdisciplinary courses about Africa while at UF, and that helped him expand my knowledge of the continent. Minoring in African Studies and getting to know the talented, intellectual, and kind people in the Center for African Studies here at UF was one of the best decisions he has made so far.
As a political science student, Mouhamadou is interested in democratic institutions, regimes types, the Sahel, African politics, and youth activism in Africa. Currently, he is taking a research class about Afrofuturism. For the classâs final project he is writing a paper that argues youth movements in Senegal and Burkina Faso could be a potential solution to stop terrorist recruitments in the Sahel and determine the type of democracy the region needs. He hopes to develop one of his papers from Spring 2017, evaluating the levels of democracies in the Sahel, into a thesis.
After graduating this semester, Mouhamadou will be attending graduate school to expand his knowledge in African politics. His ultimate goal is to represent his country, Senegal, at the United Nations someday and work on resolutions that will make the world a better place where peace becomes a reality. He would also like to bring about institutional changes in his country and strive to make government positions more accessible to the youth.