To thrive in the world of uncertainty, you have to live outside the box. The light in the box is dim, thus lack of clarity is established in the box. To be an award wining personality in the universe, you need to live outside the box, think differently and marry success.!!!😄
Opps, we have a great personality in the house, one whose excellence speaks through his personality and intellect. Lets get to meet him.
Welcome sir to honournaija_blog, can we meet you??
Thank you very much for having me on your blog, I’m honored to be interviewed as a scholar. My name is Ademola Aiyenuro, I hold a bachelor’s degree in Microbiology (first class honours) from Federal University of Technology, Akure. I am currently studying for an MPhil in Pathology at the University of Cambridge via the competitive Cambridge Trust Studentship. I am from Ondo state, I enjoy watching football and meeting new people.
Wow, Cambridge, that is huge, What inspired you to seek for scholarship and to study outside Nigeria?
Quality. I have always wanted to study in a global institution where I’ll have access to the very best resources.
Money, even if I chose to do a masters in Nigeria, I had no money to fund myself. So, my only chance to continuing for a graduate research was to win a scholarship.
Determination, Were you rejected?? how did you handle it? share your experience.
Of course I received a lot of love letters (rejection emails). How I handled it was simple, for every single rejection email I got, I made sure to apply for two different scholarships to cover up for the one I lost. I just knew my only chance of winning is to keep applying and making sure my application was very competitive. Although, there were periods I felt depressed and sad due to numerous rejections. But I knew if I gave up at any point then, I would lose everything… So, I knew if I continued and do not dwell too much on disappointing emails, then I’ll win big.
Great one, How many scholarships did you apply for before hitting the jackpot?
I may not be able to give the accurate figures here but I applied for nothing less than 20 scholarship opportunities. I also wrote to more than 200 prospective supervisors then, all in the space of 2 years. But a single ‘we are pleased to inform you…’ erased all rejections I previously received.
Fascinating, Did you feel excited after getting one? Share your experience.
Yes, I was at the clinic (my place of work) when I received an email from my prospective supervisor (then). He wrote: ‘Hello Ademola, your perseverance has paid off at last. Congratulations’ I may not be able to explain here how extremely joyful I felt, but I had to screen munch his email and use the image as my phone’s wallpaper then… Every single minute, I looked at my phone’s wallpaper then and said to myself; ‘Yes!!! I did it.’
Smiles, I can only imagine, From your experience, what are the needful things to be done before securing a scholarship?
First of all, identify your reason for wanting to apply for a scholarship. If your sole reason is to leave Nigeria, I would advise you to try immigration route as scholarship is not your best bet.
Secondly, get good grades and build a strong profile. No scholarship body wants to spend a penny on candidates who are not demonstrable in being excellent beyond their grades.
Bravo, I love this, Any platform that students can get scholarships from? please share.
The best platform I can attest to is by being among enthusiastic Scholarship applicants as well. When I started applying for scholarships in October 2018, I reached out to enthusiastic individuals who were more passionate than myself. I created a WhatsApp group then. Today the group has about 500 participants with over 30 scholars in different parts of the world. Some of the scholars you interviewed in the past few days are key members of the WhatsApp group.
Social media is very important for scholarship applicants, how they use twitter, facebook and LinkedIn is also important. I once secured a supervisor in Canada via LinkedIn.
Findaphd.com is another option as well.
Great vision. Studying outside Nigeria, how does it feel?? Stressful, tasking or quite with ease? Share your experience.
Very stressful mentally. Sometimes, I wake up in the morning with this weird feeling of ‘I want to leave and go back home’
The kind of reading here is quite intense and different from what I am used to…
But the Nigerian system has built this resilient spirit in me, and as such I feel motivated to consistently work harder here.
Too soon to give up, What are your words of advice to intending scholarship applicants.??
Be extremely intentional with your pursuits. Never ever feel discouraged. Some of your colleagues may be winning ahead of you, be rest assured that your ‘congratulatory email’ is around the corner.
Most importantly, the ‘God’ factor is extremely important. Cheers!
Woow, thank you, thank you, thank you. I love your detailed responses. I learnt too💎.
