SBACS SCHOLAR OF THE MONTH: VICTOR AGBOGA
Education has always been the driver of social mobility for me, having been raised by uneducated Nigerian parents whose life opportunities were reduced by their lack of access to education.
Education has always been the driver of social mobility for me, having been raised by uneducated Nigerian parents whose life opportunities were reduced by their lack of access to education. Growing up in the middle of a market in Lagos, where I lived with my parents and six siblings for about 18 years, was a challenging experience. However, I am fortunate to have parents who encouraged my educational aspirations despite missing out on the opportunity themselves. They spared no resources from their meagre income to ensure my fees were paid on time and school supplies provided in spite of tough conditions. When things got harder, I was again fortunate to get assistance from faith-based organisations that helped with educational bursaries.
My closeness to the church led me to join the Claretian Missionaries, a religious congregation of the Catholic Church. I saw religion as an instrument of social cohesion and reform, a means of changing the mindset and attitude of both the government and the governed, since Nigeria and Africa at large have proven to be largely religious. While serving as a missionary, I had the opportunity of working in and with several rural communities across Nigeria and learnt to engage with people of different cultures and age brackets: children, youths, and the elderly. I also learnt new cultures, traditions, and languages, and cultivated my interpersonal skills. Apart from the religious activities I coordinated, I also engaged in community development programmes like participating in HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns, initiating youth empowerment programmes and summer coaching tutorials for children. I came to realise that the majority of those I ministered to were people living in deplorable conditions, cut off from benefits of the government.
Though no longer working as a full-time missionary, I am still passionate about leadership, governmental accountability, community building, social justice and youth development. Working as a political news writer at an online media outfit with a monthly readership of over four million was a quantum leap in my social activism where I brought the news literally to the fingertips of the public.
Regarding my academic career, I studied at the Claretian Institute of Philosophy, a Catholic institution affiliated to the Imo State University, Nigeria and Pontifical Urban University, Rome, and graduated with a first-class from both universities. I was particularly interested in the socio-political philosophies of the likes of Plato, Aristotle, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean Jacque Rousseau; on how the human society should be organised and governed based on social contract theories.
Getting the Standard Bank Scholarship
My desire to deepen my knowledge in politics and development led me to applying to universities and scholarships all over the world. Funding my postgraduate studies from my own pocket was out of the question since my modest earnings were already utilised in assisting my parents and siblings. In July 2017, I eventually landed the Standard Bank Africa Chairman’s Scholarship, formerly known as the Standard Bank Derek Cooper Scholarship, for a master’s programme in African Development at the prestigious London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). I had the invaluable opportunity to study in a diverse academic environment amidst top students and faculty. For my master’s dissertation, I researched how Lagos State circumvented debates on police reforms in Nigeria to implement arguably successful interventions; a work which was later published in the Journal of Contemporary African Studies.
I was preparing for my final exams at LSE when I received an email that I had been awarded the popular German government scholarship, for another master’s in development and governance. I saw this as another opportunity to broaden my knowledge in the politics of international development, meet new people, and learn a new language. After graduating from the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany, I returned to the UK in 2020 for a PhD in Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. I had to choose between the Mo Ibrahim scholarship at the School of Oriental and African Studies and the PAIS Studentship at Warwick to fund my PhD research. The research which examines how African voters respond when their elected representatives switch political parties has won grants from the British Institute of East Africa (BIEA), The Working Group in African Political Economy (WGAPE) and emerged the winner of the 2022 Commonwealth Routledge PhD studentship.
Extracurricular
In June 2020, I took the initiative to start a YouTube channel on international scholarships for bright but financially challenged students around the world. Presently with over 38,000 subscribers, I use the channel to give step by step guidance on how to apply for international scholarships around the world mostly at the postgraduate level. The weekly videos on the channel break down the scholarship application processes and intend to match driven students to generous educational opportunities anywhere in the world. In 2021, 91 subscribers from the channel won fully funded scholarships at top universities on every continent on the globe, and in 2022, we already have 111 fully funded scholarship recipients on every continent as of August.
The channel also has a broad viewership from around the world, thereby forming a wide global network of students and scholarship hopefuls. The YouTube channel bagged an advertising deal with Google over a year ago and the revenue from the deal is used to pay off application fees, and standardised tests for indigent students. The channel has been able to broker other partnerships, including with Amber (a student accommodation booking service present in about 20 countries), Grammarly (an online essay editing software), and QS (a student service and university ranking organisation). About £8,000 has been disbursed in financial assistance to students around the world.
I am eternally grateful to all those who have contributed to my academic journey so far, especially Standard Bank Africa, whose investment continues to yield fruits to this day. I hope to pay it forward by serving as a source of encouragement and support to students from financially challenged backgrounds.
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The Standard Bank Africa Chairman’s scholarship is an annual scholarship that funds nine exceptional young Africans to study a master’s degree at one of the top three universities in the United Kingdom, namely: University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, and the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Since 2013, the SBAC scholarship has supported numerous young Africans who now work in different fields — academia, arts, business, civic space — within and outside the African continent.
Victor Agboga was a 2017/18 SBAC Scholar. He studied the MSc. in African Development at the London School of Economics and Political Science, London, United Kingdom.
Originally published at https://medium.com on October 1, 2022.
