In her current position, she leads a team of changemakers to drive development initiatives, organize outreaches, conduct research, and implement projects to facilitate inclusive and sustainable rural development. Under her leadership, the organization has empowered rural farmers, helped many rural primary pupils get back to school, provided food assistance to end hunger, given relief materials to ameliorate poverty, executed medical outreaches to improve rural health, and provided portable water to ensure access to water and better hygiene in rural Nigeria.

Damilola is the convener of the Young Rural Developers Summit (YORDS). In 2020, she undertook a Policy Research Assistant role at the Innovation Lab for Policy Leadership in Agriculture and Food Security (PiLAF) (a USAID-funded project through Michigan State University’s Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy Research Capacity and Influence). In this role, she collaborated with a team of researchers to conduct policy research in agriculture, food security, and related matters in Nigeria, culminating in publications like journal articles, policy brief and discussion paper.

Damilola is a multi-award winner whose commitment to excellence, selfless service, and effecting positive change has attracted multiple recognitions. Among others, she was recognized as one of the Top 50 Women Leaders in Oregon for 2023 and won the Best Poster award at the 13th Annual Pacific Northwest Water Research Symposium (2023). She was a recipient of the prestigious Oregon State University Provost’s Distinguished Graduate Fellowship in 2022, received the RNI Exemplary Leadership Award in 2021, and emerged as Union Rise Challenge Winner in 2020. In 2019, she was recognized as the best graduating Masters’ student and was previously awarded (in 2016) the Departmental Prize and ZARD Scholarships for the best graduating undergraduate student for the 2013/2014 Academic Session at the Department of Agricultural Extension & Rural Development, University of Ibadan, Nigeria.

Under her leadership, Rural Nurture Initiative has also been recognized with awards like the Nigerian Volunteers Award (2022), Go-for-It Africa’s Sustainable Impact Award (2021), and the Union Bank Enabling NGOs for Success Grant (2019).

Damilola possesses a wealth of expertise in community engagement through strategic communication and bottom-up approaches, as well as quantitative and qualitative social, humanitarian, and developmental research and modeling. She has a strong interest in the areas of rural development, non-profit management, public policy, social welfare, agriculture, and food security. In addition, Damilola possesses strong analytical and technical skills and is proficient in the use of computer application packages such as Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Corel Draw, Adobe Photoshop, Filmora, WordPress CMS, ArcGIS, and Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS).