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When New Hampshire native Paige Balcom ’16 first applied to the Â鶹app, it wasn’t her top choice. But after being offered a full academic scholarship, she decided to stay in-state — a decision that set her on a path spanning engineering, education, entrepreneurship, and global impact.

Today, Balcom is the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Takataka Plastics in Uganda and a current Fulbright Scholar. She was recently honored with the Alnoba Foundation’s Gutsy Young Leader Award, which recognizes extraordinary leaders under 40 who demonstrate grit, integrity, and measurable impact in advancing environmental justice, social justice, or opportunities for young people.

In the following conversation, Balcom reflects on her journey from UNH to international impact and how her time as a Wildcat helped shape the work she does today.

What does it mean to you to be recognized by Alnoba with the Gutsy Young Leader Award?

I was deeply honored and grateful to receive the award. Especially after spending time at the Alnoba campus getting to know more about their purpose and values and getting to know former awardees, I was really impressed with the work the Alnoba Foundation does, with the Lewis Family, and the vision that drives their work. The other awardees were also incredible, and I look forward to learning more from this community.

This recent award is one of many you’ve received since being a student at UNH. Which one are you most proud of and why?

Wow, that’s a tough one. I was really honored to receive the UNH Social Entrepreneur of the Year Award two years ago because social entrepreneurship is the core of what I do, and it was really special to be picked from among all the distinguished UNH alumni to be recognized for that. I’m also grateful I received a Fulbright Scholar fellowship last year to expand my teaching and research at Gulu University. grateful that it allowed me to do more teaching and research, which I really love and enjoy.

What advice do you have for current UNH students as they plan their next steps — whether that’s starting a career or pursuing graduate school?

I would advise them to stay curious, be humble, and ask lots of questions. Ask for help. People are almost always willing to spare time to share their knowledge with students and young people. Identify a few people you respect and aspire to be like and ask them to be your mentor. Reach out when you need advice and meet up every so often to just chat. You will learn and grow a lot. 

Also, don’t worry too much about picking the best next step or finding the best opportunity after college. Life is full of twists and turns—the path you choose now probably won’t be what you end up doing the rest of your life, but your next step will be a stepping stone to the one after that.

How did your UNH experience prepare you for graduate school and your career?

I think my UNH experience laid a strong foundation for graduate school and my career. My classes at UNH were broad and covered a lot of topics. The Honors classes were especially rigorous and helped prepare me for graduate school.

UNH’s entrepreneurship ecosystem also influenced me. At the time, my friends and I were just looking for funding for our project, but the entrepreneurship competitions and networks sparked something in me. I loved figuring out how we could solve a real-world problem and help people. 

And I loved pitching. I continued entering entrepreneurship competitions while a Ph.D. student at UC Berkeley and ultimately co-founded Takataka Plastics, our social enterprise in Uganda that now employs nearly 60 full-time staff. We’ve developed an innovative product to locally recycle plastic water bottles into construction tiles.

Where did your passion for sharing your work on an international scale come from?

I always had a desire to use engineering to help people and make the world better, influenced by my upbringing and a trip to Haiti with my church in high school. I joined the UNH Engineers Without Borders chapter in my first weeks at campus, and they already had a project in Lukodi, Uganda. I got to travel to Lukodi in my sophomore year, which led to living there for a gap year between undergrad and grad school, which was a very impactful experience. I was deeply unsettled by how difficult it was for my Ugandan friends to get jobs and how hard these young mothers struggled to provide for their children. I wrestled with the realization of how starkly different our life trajectories were just by the fact that I was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire, and not in a Ugandan village. My friendship with these Ugandan young women I lived with inspired me to want to share the privileges and utilize the education I had been blessed with to help create dignified jobs and opportunities for Ugandan youth.

What does your day-to-day work look like?

Every day is different, but I spend a lot of time at our Takataka Plastics office working with our team. We’re still a start-up, so I wear a lot of hats. I lead the Engineering side of Takataka Plastics, and we’re currently working on developing a new version of our TakaTiles, so it’s a mixture of research, experiments, review meetings, brainstorming, and field trials. I also do a lot of management, budgeting and grant writing (not so fun), impact reporting, mentoring junior staff, calls with mentors and funders, etc. 

Every day, our staff all eat together — we provide the typical lunch of posho and beans. Sitting under the mango tree, chatting and joking with everyone is one of the highlights of my day. Every Thursday afternoon, we all gather for a session led by our counsellor and discuss a topic related to life skills and personal development. Nearly half of our staff are from vulnerable backgrounds and 26% did not study beyond primary school, so these sessions have a big impact on our staff’s individual development as well as our teamwork. 

I also spend some time every week preparing lectures, grading assignments, and teaching at Gulu University. The university is close to our current Takataka Plastics office, so I cycle to campus. I also often mentor students on their projects, and I’m an advisor to the newly founded student Sustainability Club.

Every day is different, usually packed, often exhausting ... but I love the work I get to do.