Image: University of Cambridge
For his work in encouraging gifted students from Africa to aspire to high-quality education, PhD student David Izuogu has received an award from the University of Cambridge.
David is a second-year PhD candidate studying computational chemistry with Dr Alex Thom. He is one of the inaugural recipients of the Vice-Chancellor's Social Impact Awards.
He is pictured above receiving his commendation from Professor Stephen J Toope, the University Vice-Chancellor.
"These initiatives are very important, precisely because for many African students there is a myth constructed around Cambridge that makes the university unreachable to them."
David is the founder of the Africa Of Our Dream Initiative, a foundation aiming to provide access to quality education and Medicare in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as empowering women and young people.
In this role, he has organised a Cambridge-Nigeria Outreach Programme in three different Nigerian universities, started a Science Festival and a 'Code your Way out of Poverty' project, forged research links between Cambridge and Africa, and used his own savings to provide bursaries and pay application fees for talented Nigerian students to come to Cambridge.
David’s nominator said that "These initiatives are very important, precisely because for many African students there is a myth constructed around Cambridge that makes the university unreachable to them."
David (pictured right visiting a secondary technical school in Imo State, Nigeria, last autumn) says: "It is humbling when the things I do to help make the world a better place than I found it are given recognition by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge. I am honoured and this will motivate me to push myself a little harder, beyond my doubts."
The awards were created to celebrate students like David who have shown exceptional achievement and commitment to social change.
He grew up in Nigeria. Financial hardship there made it difficult for him to finish school and there were times, he says, "when I thought I would never see the four walls of a university".
To fund himself through his chemistry degree at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka he had to turn entrepreneur. He wrote chemistry textbooks and ran coaching sessions for younger students. Then his top-of-the class academic performance secured him a scholarship. The Japanese government awarded him funding to study at Hokkaido University.
This changed his life, opening his eyes to possibilities he hadn't previously thought of. "It inspired me to think beyond the present," he says.
"I've been fortunate, and that is why I want to give back."
He stayed in Japan for his Master's degree and then secured support from the Cambridge-Africa programme, Cambridge Trust and the Islamic Development Bank to study for a PhD here in Cambridge.
"I've been fortunate," he says, "and that is why I want to give back." Through the Africa of Our Dream Initiative, he recently returned to Nigera to run an outreach programme encouraging more secondary school and university students to aspire to high-quality education.
"Africa is the future - and we should be prepared to embrace it," he says.