In August, I travelled to Nigeria and Ghana to support posts’ marketing campaigns. Read about my experience travelling around these countries and answering questions from potential Chevening Scholars.
My first stop was Abuja, where the timing of my visit enabled me to attend and present at the second of the Nigerian pre-departure events. Later at the reception, I met one scholar who had brought her dad as a guest to the event. It turned out he is a Chevening Alumnus.
‘Where did you hear about Chevening?’ I asked him.
‘From my brother – he was a Chevening Scholar, too!’
Brothers was the theme of the evening as one of the outgoing scholars addressed the audience, revealing that both he and his brother had been selected for Chevening. Not only are they attending the same university, but they are studying the same course, too.
Last year, post in Nigeria held a successful workshop at the Nigerian Police Force (NPF) headquarters in Abuja, and two NPF employees went on to become scholars this year. As part of my visit, we repeated this workshop, focusing on what makes a successful Chevening application. Walking around the HQ building after the workshop and seeing the Chevening ‘Dare to Believe’ posters on the walls was one of the most surreal parts of the trip for me. It may sound bizarre, but usually we only see these posters in our storage cupboard in London, so it was nice to see them ‘in action’.
After a busy few days in Abuja, I flew west to the coastal Ghanaian capital, Accra. Due to its location in the south of the country, Augustina and her team have made a concerted effort to undertake marketing in a new region in every campaign. This year, the focus was on the Volta region and our first day was spent road-tripping up north to do a workshop at the University of Health and Allied Sciences. Over 400 students crammed into a gymnasium to hear us speak and there was definitely lots of interest from attendees. We also conducted workshops at the University of Ghana Business School and at the British Council, together with colleagues from the University of Nottingham, UKEAS, an agent for prospective applicants, and a host of current scholars and alumni.
I also had the opportunity to participate in a number of media interviews, alongside my colleagues from the High Commission and various Chevening Alumni. In Accra, Chevening Alumni seemed to pop up everywhere we went and it was no surprise that when we went to Citi FM, our interviewer announced that he was a Chevening Alumnus too!
The Americas Directorate has recently been very busy hosting a series of roundtable discussions for various Latin American scholar groups. I have been lucky enough to attend a few of these, including one for Argentinian scholars, another for Central American and Cuban scholars, and another for a large group of Brazilian scholars. The discussions largely focused on […]
Two Chevening officer regional conferences have recently taken place around the globe: the first in South-East Asia and the second in Sub-Saharan Africa. These are the third and fourth regional conferences that have taken place since the initiative was first launched in 2015. Both conferences were organised and attended by members of the International team […]
Meet Programme Officer – International, Natalie. Before joining Chevening, Natalie lived in Hue, Vietnam, where she taught English as a foreign language after falling in love with South-East Asia during a five-month long trip. Name: Natalie Keen Countries: ASEAN (ODA) and East Africa From: Surrey, England Joined the team: June 2016 Previous Chevening experience: I joined […]