2022-23 ASCU Executive Committee
Nathan Odiase Osareme
President
Nathan is a 2nd year PhD student at the Judge Business School. He advances academic conversations around the strategic management of creative ecosystems. His research explores organisational style in the fashion industry and extensively examines the strategic decisions that impact stylistic choices. As part of his research, Nathan also investigates how creative identities are constructed and appraises the business development implications of creative judgments.
Before starting his PhD, Nathan completed a Master of Philosophy in Innovation, Strategy & Organisation from the University of Cambridge, where Magdalene College awarded him the Standard Bank Africa Chairman’s Scholarship. He was awarded the prestigious Mandela Rhodes Scholarship that funded his Master of Social Science Degree from the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He has a BA in Psychology from the University of Lagos, where he developed foundational skills in utilising Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis for Qualitative Research.
Muhammad Rabiu Balarabe
Secretary
Muhammad is a Nigerian and a member of the pioneer cohort of Mastercard Scholars at the University of Cambridge. He is studying an MPhil in Population Health Sciences with specific concentration in the global health theme. He is also an Early Career Researcher (ECR) with the Global Diet and Activity Research (GDAR) Network.
Before joining the University of Cambridge, Muhammad did his undergraduate degree in Natural and Environmental Sciences with a concentration on Environment and Health from the American University of Nigeria. Muhammad’s undergraduate senior research project looked at the prevalence of Noma disease (Cancrum oris) among children internally displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency in Northeast Nigeria.
On the corporate end, Muhammad is a management consultant and hopes to set up a healthcare data and information management consultancy that will address the problems associated with lack of data and poor-quality data used in healthcare research, governance, planning and interventions in Africa.
Muhammad is an experimental chef! Thank God, the experiments turn out delicious most of the time.
Salma Fallatah
Communications Chair
Salma is a Saudi-Nigerian Law student at Lucy Cavendish College. Upon graduating, she aims to work in a corporate law firm having developed an interest in that area after working as a corporate legal assistant. Prior to Cambridge, Salma obtained a BA with honours in Law & Justice from Laurentian University in Canada.
Outside Cambridge, Salma is the lead researcher on a collaborative creative project that aims to explore and document the migration of Hausa people to the Arab region as a result of the annual Hajj pilgrimage and the British Colonization of Africa in the 19th century. The project also explores the positive and negative impact of the migration as well as the intersection of Hausa and Arab culture in art, food, and music.
In her free time, Salma enjoys reading, writing poetry, and experiencing African culture through food and music
2022-23 ASCU Executive Committee
Julian Chieza
Africa Over Coffee Chair
Julian Chieza is a Masters student at the department of History at the University of Cambridge, and an alumni of the University of Oxford. His dissertation at Cambridge hopes to bridge a missing gap in Gender, Ecclesiastical and Labour history in colonial urban Zimbabwe in the 1930s to 1940s. Having studied French and Spanish as an undergraduate, Julian has a keen interest in those experiences that continue to bind and form the distinctions that only enhance the heterogeneity and complexity of those that identify with Africa both within and outside the continent. Born in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, Julian is a linguistic, poet, and the son of a former Zimbabwean footballer and coach, Tendai Chieza.
Outside the library, Julian often amuses himself by trying not to kill his various house plants and pondering the existential question: what would have happened if Sally Mugabe had lived?
Chisom Ifeobu
ASCU Mentorship Scheme Co-Chair
Chisom is a second-year geotechnical engineering PhD student at the Schofield Centre for Centrifuge Modelling and a Cambridge Africa scholar from Nigeria. She is passionate about solving the poor electricity access in Sub-Saharan Africa and how renewable energy can fill this gap. Her research aims to provide a more material-efficient and cost-effective design for onshore wind turbine foundations to be employed in Africa. She completed both her undergraduate and Master’s degrees at Cambridge and really enjoys it here and is excited to help increase representation of African students at the university.
Myesha D. Jemison
ASCU Mentorship Scheme Co-Chair
Myesha is an early career researcher and writer based in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge. Her dissertation research investigates the Cambridge Analytica’s use of datamining, misinformation/disinformation, and other tools to influence political elections in sub-Saharan Africa with a focus on Kenya and Nigeria. Broadly, Myesha’s interests centre on intersections between technology and inequity, Indigenous knowledge and power, cultural understanding and learning, and Black and Indigenous imaginations of future. At Cambridge, in addition to being Co-chair of the Cambridge University African Students Mentorship Programme (CAMP), she is a Gates Cambridge Scholar, Founder and President of the Afro-American Society, and a Trustee of the Cambridge University Student Union.
Before beginning her PhD, Myesha completed her masters at Columbia University and earned her bachelors at Princeton University, where she served her fellow students as the first Black Woman elected as student-body (SU) president.
Myesha spends her “spare time” highlighting Black and Indigenous narrative histories via Scholourship, travelling internationally (39 countries so far), hosting socials, coding, and eating seasoned food.
Chike Pilgrim
Welfare Officer
Chike Pilgrim is a writer, historian and archaeologist. He holds degrees in History from the University of the West Indies and degrees in Archaeology from the University College London and the University of Oxford. He is currently a second year PhD in Archaeology here at the University of Cambridge.
His interests include: the Archaeology of the Caribbean and the Global South, Landscape Historical Ecology, Bioarchaeology and Stable Isotope Analysis, and Maritime Archaeology. His current studies are concerned with the settlement of the Caribbean islands during the Holocene and the resultant effect of this settlement on the ecology of the islands.
He also enjoys punting, playing football, and hanging out at DarBar. He hopes to make a career out of grabbing his trowel and scrambling to ancient sites all over the globe and is happy to serve as your ASCU Welfare Officer.
2022-23 ASCU Executive Committee
Enoch Alex
Home Outreach Initiative Chair
Enoch Alex is a Ph.D. Candidate of Physiology, Development, and Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge and also, a Jameel Education Foundation and Cambridge Trust Scholar. Enoch received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Human Physiology from Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Nigeria. He is passionate about understanding the genetic basis of Obesity, and the Molecular Mechanism that controls Energy Homeostasis.
Enoch’s overarching goal is to provide new insights into the genetic and molecular underpinnings of obesity and related metabolic diseases that will inform the development of novel therapeutics.
Enoch also enjoys collaborating with researchers from different disciplines to develop new skills and solve new problems. Enoch has a solid commitment to innovation, community development, and a passion for entrepreneurship; being part of a start-up tech company in Nigeria enabled him to develop some basic skills in software engineering and artificial intelligence (AI).
In his free time, Enoch enjoys watching movies, reading, or just analyzing the Forex Market.
Denise Ingabire
Treasurer
Denise is a Rwandan student pursuing the MBA at the University of Cambridge, and a member of Hughes Hall college. She received her BSBA in Marketing with a minor in international business, from the Walton college of business at the University of Arkansas, USA, from where she received the First-ranked Senior Scholar, and Outstanding Student in Marketing awards.
Denise is also a member of Beta Gamma Sigma international business honor society.
Prior to joining the University of Cambridge, Denise worked as a consultant and interim advisor to the CEO at the Rwanda Development board, through development partner: TradeMark East Africa (TMEA).
Denise is interested in social impact projects
Languages: English (fluent), Kinyarwanda (native), Spanish (working), French (conversant)
Sheila Ojwang
Social Chair
Sheila Atieno Ojwang is a Kenyan Architectural Designer pursuing a Master of Philosophy in Architecture and Urban Studies at the University of Cambridge. She is a member of the pioneer cohort of MasterCard scholars at Oxbridge.
Sheila earned a Bachelor of Architectural Studies and Bachelor a of Architecture, both with honours, from the University of Nairobi, Kenya. Her design and research work intersects the themes of 3D printing, traditional architecture, sustainable construction materials, and net zero buildings.
As an emerging expert, she conglomerates the power of practice, research, and advocacy to promote architectural design innovation and environmental development in Kenya and beyond. Most recently, she was an Engineering for Change fellow working to increase net zero buildings by measuring carbon emissions and providing recommendations for lowering the carbon footprint of buildings in Kenya.
Sheila is a graduate member of the Kenya Green Building Society (KGBS) and Women in Real Estate Kenya (WIRE) where she undertakes several volunteering and leadership roles. She is passionate about mentorship and the development of women in the built environment and has served as the Mentorship Chairperson in the WIRE Youth Board.
As the social chair, Sheila is enthused about organizing events that endow African scholars with a networking hub and a home away from home.
Sheila loves experiencing African culture through food, music, art, and photography. She enjoys nature viewing, watching and playing sports, hiking, dancing, and drinking tea.
2022-23 ASCU Executive Committee
Inioluwa Afolabi
Academic Chair
Inioluwa is a Nigerian and a member of the first cohort of MasterCard Scholars at the University of Cambridge. She is currently pursuing her MPhil in Chemistry in the ICE research group. Her research focuses on using machine learning techniques and density functional theory to investigate the properties of materials for effective carbon capture. Before joining the University of Cambridge, Inioluwa had her undergraduate degree in the Department of Chemistry at the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH). In her undergraduate research, she developed activated carbon from agricultural wastes for the adsorption of Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals from wastewater.
Inioluwa is passionate about environmental sustainability with an interests in climate change, waste management, and green hydrogen technology. She aims to harness the power of machine learning and chemistry to solve environmental issues to make the world a better place for all.
Spencer Kyirem
Africa Together Conference Chair
Spencer is a first-generation Ghanaian graduate with a bachelor's degree in Political Studies from Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). He acknowledges that his undergraduate education was possible through the sponsorship of Compassion International Ghana. He has keen interest in important topics including elections, democracy, and African development because of his previous research position at KNUST. With the generous scholarship of the Philomathia Foundation, Spencer believes that his academic journey at the University of Cambridge for an MPhil in African Studies is a significant step to deepen his understanding of the themes and making his career ambitions a reality.
He enjoys playing basketball, soccer, and table tennis in addition to volunteering, reading, and watching comedy skits. He is open to meeting like-minded individuals in Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and elsewhere, who are passionate to impact our world.
Paula-Peace James-Okoro Africa Together Conference Logistics Chair
Paula-Peace is a first-year Clinical Biochemistry PhD student at the Institute of Metabolic Sciences from Nigeria. At Cambridge, she is funded by the Gates Cambridge scholarship and the Doctoral Training Programme in Medical Research (DTP-MR) PhD studentship at the School of Clinical Medicine. Her research focusses on elucidating the mechanisms that control body weight and blood sugar levels, especially in the gut-brain-pancreatic axis, and how they can be harnessed to develop treatments for metabolic diseases like obesity and type 2 diabetes. She is an aspiring medical research scientist keen on contributing to the development of biomedical infrastructure that can alleviate the metabolic disease burden in Africa.
Prior to starting her PhD program, Paula-Peace earned her Bachelors degree in Biochemistry from Covenant University, Nigeria.
Outside academics, she enjoys volunteering with community development programs to improve the lives of others through education and health campaigns.
Raymond Damptey Owusu
Africa Together Conference Head of Fundraising
Raymond is a Commonwealth Shared Scholar who is pursuing an MPhil in Development Studies at Wolfson College. Raymond graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Studies from Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology prior to enrolling in Cambridge. The Heart to Heart Ghana Foundation, led by Raymond, works to support less privileged individuals in African societies.
His areas of interest are sustainable development and poverty-reduction strategies on the African continent. He is keen on and committed to learning together with and from colleagues in the ASCU to ensure the wellbeing of African students at Cambridge.
What the ASCU logo means
The logo is an Adinkra symbol from the Akan people of Ghana. The Siamese Crocodiles symbolize democracy and unity. The crocodiles share one stomach, yet they fight over food. Like Siamese crocodiles, our survival depends on our ability to share and peacefully co-exist or continue on the path of self-annihilation because of short sighted greed and selfishness