Master of Public Administration (MPA)

A Sri Lankan native, Nipuna Ambanpola currently serves as the Co-Founder & Executive Director of IVolunteer International, a technological nonprofit producing innovative technologies to connect volunteers to volunteer projects worldwide. Prior to his arrival in the United States, Nipuna was awarded the Most Outstanding Royalist Award by the President of Sri Lanka for an outstanding service devoted to his high school, city, and the country. In 2015, Nipuna was awarded the Georgia Rotary Student Program which sponsored him to study in the United States. In 2017, Nipuna established the Rotary District for the Rotary District 6920 and was the first-ever District Rotaract Representative. For his service to the community, he was recognized as a Rotary Youth-All Star by Rotary International in 2017 and was awarded the Paul Harris Fellow and the Will Watt Fellow by the Rotary District 6920. For the years 2017-18, Nipuna served as the Student Government President of Georgia Southern University and was pivotal in steering the university through a consolidation. Nipuna represented 20,000+ students across three campuses and a partnering SGA and was instrumental in writing policy, administering committees, and forming one Georgia Southern University across three campuses. During his time as SGA President, Nipuna sat on various committees including Vice Presidential Search Committees and the Presidential Diversity Advisory Committee. Nipuna was invited to speak at TEDx Savannah where he spoke about how volunteering can unite the world. Through his work with the nonprofit, he spoke at the Global Goals Summit at the United Nations HQ in New York and at the University Scholar’s Leadership Symposium in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In 2019, Nipuna was awarded the Nick Mamalakis Emerging Eagle Award, the highest accolade awarded by Georgia Southern for service.