Kids dancing in a field change everything.
Robert Stephenson — an award-winning Irish social entrepreneur, founder of Blastbeat and Climate Actions Now — travelled to Kigali with Ugandan artist Sir Kisoro to record with top Rwandan artist Bushali. Behind their hotel, they found a group of kids practising dance in a field. Instead of walking past, they invited them into Sir Kisoro's music video. The group became Tia Kids.
Watch Tia Kids in Sir Kisoro's video.
From one video to a movement.
Robert, Sir Kisoro and Bushali — with Joshua Umukundwa of Kigali Protocol — decided these dancers deserved more than a cameo. With Rwandan artists and entrepreneurs as mentors, the idea grew into an academy: not just discovering talent, but developing it. Dance, music, fashion, content creation, and the business skills to turn creativity into a living.
A leader from the same streets.
Boaz Ntagozera, CCF's founder and choreographer, leads a troupe of young dancers from Kigali's toughest neighbourhoods. Robert has sponsored Boaz's education for years and mentors him as he builds CCF — proof that the academy's pathway works, because its own leader walked it first.
The African Celtic Kilt.
After watching Braveheart one night, Boaz woke to the sight of his mother's Rwandan printed fabrics — and two worlds collided. He fused the Scottish kilt with African prints to create the African Celtic Kilt: practical, unisex, one-size stagewear for growing dancers, and a statement honouring how African communities — like the Pedi warriors of 1879 — have always transformed outside influences into something powerfully their own. The kilts debuted at Kigali Fashion Week 2026. Read the full story →
Two decades. Four continents. One beat.
The academy runs on the DNA of Blastbeat, Robert's multi-award-winning youth social enterprise program delivered across four continents over two decades — now brought to Rwanda under Climate Actions Now.
