About Me - Let's Connect


Jennifer Okaima Piette née Ehidiamen is a tech‑savvy journalist‑turned‑communications professional keen about using the new media as a tool to disseminate information, foster collaboration, and influence positive development outcomes. She has more than a decade of experience shaping narratives across energy, education, climate change, entrepreneurship, women empowerment, digitization, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), and other sectors. Her life’s passion is rooted in the intersection between human‑centered communications and global development. She is also a committed wife to a loving man and a devoted mother of two beautiful children.

EDUCATION:

Jennifer was once described as one of the next generation of communicators during a Georgetown University’s GAIN & Center for Social Impact Communication event. A graduate of Mass Communication from the Nigerian Institute of Journalism, Lagos, Nigeria, and M.A. in Business and Economics Reporting from Columbia University (Graduate School of Journalism), Jennifer believes that a media that empowers people with accurate information is a powerful vehicle that can foster development, locally and internationally, for public good. While in college as an undergraduate at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism, Jennifer served as a student reporter and an avid youth columnist between January 2007 and January 2012 at The Nation, one of the national newspapers in Nigeria.

ACADEMIC RESEARCH:

She also wrote several research projects, including a thesis on the usage of news pictures in newspapers, focusing on front‑page photographs in The Guardian and The Punch. In grad school, she authored a 10,000‑word essay exploring Nigeria’s push for economic diversification during the 2015 global oil price crash and the $1.5 billion acquisition of NYSE‑listed ConocoPhillips’ upstream oil and gas assets by the country’s largest indigenous oil company. She also researched on the changing media landscape especially focused on "What the Growth of Internet Penetration Means for Media Business in Nigeria."

PORTFOLIO:

Between 2009 and 2010, Jennifer served as an Atlas Corps Fellow at One World Youth Project (OWYP) in Washington, D.C., as Communications and School Partnership Director. She helped OWYP develop an online communication strategy and created a system for sustainability. Her experience in international journalism also includes covering President Obama’s Meeting with Young African Leaders in Washington, D.C., and reporting live on the first Rolex Young Laureates Awards in Geneva, Switzerland. Jennifer served as a speaker during the World Press Freedom Day 2011 (WPFD) that held in Washington, D.C., between May 1st–3rd. She spoke on youth consumption of the new media, its challenges, and opportunities, under the theme “Digital Native: The New Media Generation.”

In October 2011, Jennifer served as one of the youth bloggers who covered the 7th UNESCO Youth Forum in Paris. She also served as the Online Curator and Blog Editor for the UNAIDS New Generation Leadership Strategy (CrowdOutAIDS), a consultancy service rendered as part of the collaborative crowdsourcing process to develop the first‑ever UNAIDS strategy on HIV and young people.

In late 2012, she spent three months in Ethiopia, where she worked with the Global Press Institute team and GirlHub/Nike Foundation local partners to train young girls aged 17–25 on how to use multimedia tools for development communication. She later replicated the experience in North‑Central Nigeria, where she worked with the English Department of GSSS to set up its first Press Club in 2013, as a member of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC).

Her growing interest in media entrepreneurship inspired her to launch RuralReporters.com, covering under‑reported news stories for development. In 2012, she was recruited to serve as a pioneer Online Editor (and Social Media Strategist) at Ventures Africa, a pan‑African business magazine celebrating the entrepreneurial spirit and the reward of hard work in Africa. She successfully worked with the Managing Editor and Founders to recruit editorial staff, develop editorial policies, and foster partnerships. In 2013, Jennifer received a $15,000 grant to cover global health and development in Nigeria as one of the six New Media Fellows for the International Reporting Project (IRP). She also produced several long form stories, short videos and audio stories as a reporter for Voice of America (VOA).

In 2018, UNICEF recruited her to develop and implement a communications and advocacy strategy for a national advocacy campaign in Nigeria. The campaign, “Clean Nigeria: Use the Toilet,” influenced the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to sign an executive order to prioritize Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) in Nigeria (the new administration sustained the commitment for continuity).

Her published books include In Days To Come (2004), Preserving My Saltiness (2011), and Half a Loaf & a Bakery (2013).


AWARDS:
Jennifer is a recipient of many awards. In November 2010, Jennifer was awarded the LEAP Africa Nigerian Youth Leadership Award for her work as an outstanding Nigerian youth leader and her commitment to development. . She is also a recipient of the 2013 Innovative Young Journalist Award by  Journalists for Christ International Outreach and the 2016 Foreign Press Association Award.


The best is yet to come:

Jennifer hopes to keep reaching out to other youths through mentoring via BeforeGrad (www.beforegraduation.org) and RuralReporters, two pet projects she is very passionate about.

Jennifer believes God created youth for a purpose and thus must not be wasted in frivolities.

Favorite quote: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”



Interview Archive:

With Paul Jones: FB Diva Friday Chronicles - Author Jennifer Ehidiamen
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