I am a first year student reading Human Sciences at St Catherine's College Oxford and am a Laidlaw research scholar in association with the SDG Impact Lab for 2025
I am a Critical Realist researcher in the Sociology of Education, developing a theory of Positive Organisational Culture. My research explores how organisational environments shape people's experiences, opportunities, and sense of belonging, with an initial focus on the transition to secondary schooling and wider implications for organisations beyond education.
Youness Robert-Tahiri
Founder, HaHaHelps & MSocSci Psychology Candidate, University of Cape Town
Hello! I’m a psychology researcher and the founder of HaHaHelps, a comedy-based psychosocial programme designed to support young people in residential care.
I am currently completing an MSocSci in Psychology at the University of Cape Town, where my dissertation examines the feasibility of HaHaHelps with adolescents in South African child and youth care centres. My broader interests include youth mental health, psychosocial intervention development, implementation, participatory approaches, and the use of humour and play to support connection, emotional expression, self-efficacy, and coping with uncertainty.
HaHaHelps grew out of my Laidlaw Leadership-in-Action project at SOS Children’s Villages in Cape Town, where I designed and facilitated an improv-comedy programme for adolescents. Since then, I have continued developing and delivering the programme with young people in residential care and am now studying how it can be refined, evaluated, and ultimately adapted for use in other communities and settings.
Before this, my Laidlaw research at the University of Toronto examined relationships between childhood adversity, aggression, and self-regulation.
I’d love to connect with other Laidlaw Scholars and alumni interested in youth mental health, social impact, intervention development, social entrepreneurship, or simply finding creative ways to turn research into something useful in the world.
Hi everyone! I run the CraftHER Leadership-in-action program by @Swara - Voice of Women. Here's our IG: www.instagram.com/craftherbyswara/
I’m Asha Scaria Vettoor, an entrepreneur and Laidlaw Scholar from the University of Oxford. I run Swara, a social enterprise based in India that creates income opportunities for women through ethical fashion and storytelling. We also host CraftHER, a 6-week Leadership-in-Action program that brings Laidlaw scholars from around the world to Kerala to learn from women-led enterprises, grassroots organisations, and artisan communities.
I’m passionate about building bridges between global learners and local changemakers in my community and always up for a conversation on social entrepreneurship, ethical supply chains, or running programs in remote parts of India.
