After 22 rejections, Akinbode Badiu receives the Eramus Mundus Scholarship to go from Igboora to Barcelona.
After receiving the prestigious Erasmus Mundus scholarship, young Nigerian Badiu Akinbode has taken his time to share his scholarship experience.
Badiu Akinbode and 133 other Nigerians received the coveted Erasmus Mundus Joint Masters Degree fellowship this year.
Inspiringly, Badiu Akinbode revealed that he had applied for 23 scholarship programs between 2019 and 2021, with just the Erasmus Scholarship being accepted.
He characterized himself as strategic in his article “Behind the Scene: The Village Boy in Barcelona.” He began his adventure in 2017, but he didn’t apply for any scholarships until 2019, giving him plenty of time to establish his reputation.
Read the entire article:
“Behind the Scene: Barcelona’s Village Boy.” I live next door as a boy, and I spend more than half of my life in my village, Igboora, which is one of the seven towns in Ibarapa and is thought to have the highest twin-rate in the world.
It should still be true that I once referred to myself as a poor village boy. Gaining an international scholarship through the “Erasmus Mundus Scholarship” was a long process. I remembered that in my senior year (2017), I had just returned from an industrial training program where I had been trained by OK Foods Nigeria Limited, one of Nigeria’s top FMCG companies.
I was essentially doing the same thing every other day when I thought, ‘This is boring, why can’t I explore academics?’ That’s when I started to nurture the idea of going into academics someday. However, I told myself that I had preferred to be an academic in the context of my then mentor, Prof. Pius Adesanmi, and I dreamed of being a Canadian academic as if my life depended on it. To do this, I knew I was in dire need of a scholarship abroad, equipped with a second class honors (upper division) degree.
For the first time, I felt depressed and nearly wished I had focused all of my efforts on earning a first-class degree, which would have improved my chances of receiving an international scholarship.
Luckily enough, I am a Futarian, I must say this, being a Futarian gives you an extra edge ahead of your peers in getting an International scholarship, almost half of my lecturers were Scholars in Europe or America at a point during their studies, that’s no gain saying, in June of 2017, my friend, Samuel Ayanleye told me there’s a training on Facebook by a group of FUTA alumni known as “The shoulders giant” It was founded by a FUTA alumnus who will later become my mentor and guardian: Dr Milton Babajide Macaulay , I remembered the first session was anchored by Femi Ogunlalu, now a Doctoral student in the United State of America’s and the guest speaker was Dr Emmanuel Jesuyon Dansu who was then a graduate Student in Japan.
It was on that day that I rekindled my dream that, despite having to work twice as hard as my peers who received first-class degrees, I could obtain a scholarship through a second-class honor, just like the one I was about to graduate with after their extensive training.
I was very deliberate about using the first two years of my scholarship drive to build my profile. It is good to say that the journey started in 2017, but I didn’t apply for any scholarships until 2019. With the assistance of Mr. Kazeem Jimoh, my then-head of department when I was a National Diploma student at The Polytechnic Ibadan, Saki campus, I was able to serve my fatherland at my alma mata as an assistant lecturer, which is a lovely addition to my resume.
I spent more than a year teaching with passion, lecturing about four or five courses, including Higher National Diploma students, and gaining useful research skills like writing a manuscript for publication in reputable journals, among many others. However, I was not convinced that my profile was rich enough to be noticed by any international scholarship selection committee.
I therefore enrolled in a Master’s program at my alma mater with the goal of graduating with distinction this time. In the process, I will make sure to publish as much as I can. By the end of 2019, I had two publications in reputable peer-reviewed international journals in my arsenal, along with a host of other attributes that convinced the selection committee that I was a good fit.
It is sufficient to say that my writing abilities are not to be dismissed with a backhand; my leadership and volunteer experiences are so extensive that I am unable to list them all on my resume; I have attended too many relevant conferences, seminars, and lectures to list them all. As a result, the first two years were dedicated to developing my research and teaching experience while pursuing a Master’s degree by the end of 2019.
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Despite the encouragement of my friends, particularly Samuel Ayanleye, who is currently a doctoral student at Mississippi State University after completing his Master’s program with distinction at the University of British Columbia, and a host of other friends, mostly from the “Potential Scholars WhatsApp group” created by my friend and brother: Ademola Emmanuel Aiyenuro, who is currently a master’s candidate at Cambridge University, I had applied to about ten scholarships in total and had been rejected by the middle of 2020.
By the time I finished my MSc, I had hoped that my chances of graduating with a distinction would have increased because I had worked, prayed, and read a lot. However, when the ASUU strike hit Nigerian students, I was severely shaken, and I would not have graduated with a distinction by the time the next application year began in September or October. Fortunately, I had been working with other researchers and mentors in my field of study since 2018 and had sent manuscripts in their numbers as well, as of the time I sent my last application in March 2021.
By the time the news leaked out that I had actually received a “YES” to study for a Master in Quality and Analytical Laboratory from the University of Barcelona, which is ranked number one in Spain, 24th in Europe, and 87th in the world by the Center for World University Rankings, I had applied for 24 scholarships worldwide between 2019 and 2021 with only one “YES.” I had about 10 publications in reputable international journals, and I also had an MSc degree in sight.
Though there have been times when I gave myself a well-earned break from pursuing scholarships, I never decided to give up, even though I must admit that I was depressed in between the YES and August 2020 after being rejected from the Mandela Rhodes Foundation Scholarship at the last stage. You cannot have the kind of friends, mentors, and guardians that I have and give up; that is nearly impossible. I won’t name them out of fear of omission. The majority are FUTA Alumni, while others are guardians with bases in Europe and America.
Lest I forget, It is common knowledge amongst Intending scholars from Nigeria who are always reluctant to write standardized test like GRE/TOEFL/IELTS, in lieu of this, prior to applying for ERASMUS MUNDUS Scholarship that got me my “YES” I had enrolled for an IELTS tutorial courtesy of Erudite Millenium founded by Saheed Oladele in December of 2020, in two weeks, I was groomed for the examination which I passed with no hitch, I therefore decided to apply for programs where IELTS/TOEFL is mandatory knowing quite alright that the competition therein will perhaps be lesser, I was not wrong, 3 out of every 10 intending scholars have a Standardized English Test in their arsenal, the rest relied on the Certificate of English proficiency from their University, which is not a bad idea after all, it must have been my drive for a difference that made me enrolled and wrote IELTS.
Before finishing my Master’s degree in FUTA, which naturally included a Distinction grade, nine international peer-reviewed publications, a publication in an NIFST conference proceeding, and three more publications under review, I was fortunate enough to be awarded the highly coveted Erasmus Mundus Scholarship by Allah. Thank God!
I am appreciative of the abundance of kind words from my friends, mentors, mentees, and both mothers and fathers. E seun, sir/madam, modupe lopolopo I pray that wonderful things will always happen in our homes as well. I’m excitedly anticipating this adventure. NB: I’ve included photos of my rejects from 2019–2021, my first day of classes at the University of Barcelona, my visit to Camp Nou, which is only a two-minute walk from my faculty, and the photographs I took at the orientation for the 134 Nigerian Erasmus Mundus Scholars.
