Jackie and Mike Bezos were inspired to launch the Bezos Scholars Program after observing how young people can be co-creators in powerful solutions to some of our world’s most complex problems. Incredible young people like these can be found everywhere — and each summer since 2005, the Bezos Scholars Program team has had the pleasure of seeing a new cohort of 17 of these exceptional juniors from the U.S. and Africa meet for the first time at the Aspen Ideas Festival.

Over Labor Day weekend, almost 100 program graduates returned to the Aspen Institute Campus to reconnect and explore personal growth and professional development at the second ever Bezos Scholars Reunion. At the event, Scholar alums shared about how the leadership experience as rising high school juniors and seniors sparked a lifetime of curiosity, weaved together passions, and grounded them in commitment to giving back that spanned from the classroom to their careers.

The three-day weekend began with a welcome from co-founder Mike Bezos and Bezos Family Foundation President John Deasy. Attendees experienced a powerful keynote from education rights advocate Shabana Basij-Rasikh and workshops and roundtables with guests including TED Fellows director Lily James Olds.

When asked to describe the Bezos Scholars Program in one word, 2013 African Leadership Academy (ALA) Scholar from Kenya Gift Kiti says the experience is, “catalytic.” For 2022 ALA Scholar from Sudan and current Skidmore College student Momo Ahmed, the program is “a family. It’s a space where you ignite your creativity.” 2017 Scholar Kaetlyn Rodriguez called BSP “eye-opening,” adding that the program “changed and forever made an impact on me that changed the trajectory of my life forever.”

Ammi Lucy Hernandez, a 2021 Bezos Scholar from Miami, named the program “inviting.” The memory of her invitation to be a Scholar is vivid. Hernandez learned she was selected for the program while working a shift at her family’s shave ice business. “And I almost dropped the glass bottle that I was holding. I remember just being there in that really cold room with all my coolers and 50 flavors and being in shock they had … invited me.”

Hernandez says that before she started the Bezos Scholars Program, “I was confident in who I was as a person, but not at all in my leadership skills. I didn’t really believe that I could manage people and be trusted with a team and supply for their needs.” She says the experience taught her how to be “a leader of integrity.”

After completing undergrad, Hernandez is planning to move into the juvenile justice field, a role that will require self-care which she learned about as a Scholar. “We gained a lot of tools on how to take care of ourselves and how to step back and be the leaders that we wanted to be with grace and love, but also acknowledge our own needs and how to take care of ourselves.”

There was plenty of time to network and enjoy the surroundings, with Scholars connecting over smores and stargazing, and other excursions.

Over the weekend, Ahmed reflected on the confidence the program gave him to see himself as a change agent. BSP was where, “I got to experience loving myself to the fullest and to actually enjoy what I’ve achieved.”

Yale freshman Bella Garcia completed the Bezos Scholars Program in 2022 and was a member of the only cohort to date that participated in solely virtual programming because of the pandemic. The reunion was her first time visiting the Aspen Institute campus. “I’ve appreciated the reunion because there are so many different Scholars all doing amazing things,” she said. “Some of them just started school like I did, and others are already established in the workforce.”

Many alums talked about the sustained friendships that formed during the experience. 2013 Bezos Scholar Damani Eubanks is completing a PhD at the University of Maryland and interning with the US Forest Service, studying how forests are adapting to climate change. “The weekend made room for inner reflection and space for celebrating community,” Eubanks said.

Eubanks says the high school project on STEM education that he completed as a BSP Scholar was the first time he tried hands-on teaching, going into schools for a series of weeks and running experiments with groups of students. He’s continuing to apply those skills in the classroom today, volunteering with local youth education nonprofits in the Washington, DC-area.

The reunion was also an invitation for Eubanks to reflect on professional accomplishments and personal connections, including meeting his fiancé 2013 Scholar Omolemo Matloga through the program. “This program is where our power as leaders was acknowledged and then was supported. It’s been a cool experience for me to soak everything in that from where it all began for me,” he says. Eubanks attended university with Matloga and began dating in undergrad. “Of course, this is where I met my fiancé, so it is extra special.”

P.S. Check out the 2009 cohort over the years — in 2009, then again at the first reunion in 2014, and finally in 2023.