The 2024 class of Greensprings School’s IB diploma program earned over $8.5 million worth of scholarships in April to study at prestigious universities, and among the students was Nigeria’s Emmanuela Ilok, The Guardian reported.
Ilok was awarded full scholarships to study software engineering at some of the most esteemed colleges in the world, such as Stanford, MIT, Yale, UPenn, Princeton, and Columbia. The IB diploma program is a two-year sixth-form program to prepare secondary students for life in tertiary institutions, The Guardian added.
17-year-old Ilok said the program has helped her in her education, adding that she is grateful to God, her parents and the school for their support.
“It all seems unreal,” said Ilok.
Intrigued by the teen’s intellect, education campaigner and CEO of Educare Alex Onyia highlighted her accomplishments in a post on his X page.
He wrote, “This is Emmanuela Ilok, the brilliant 17-year-old who received full scholarships to study Software Engineering at Stanford, MIT, Yale, UPenn, Princeton, and Columbia University.”
Onyia further disclosed that Ilok’s intellectual ability has already earned her national acclaim, as the British Council named her the best in Nigeria for the International General Certificate of Secondary Education.
The activist said that the young prodigy created software that uses machine learning to identify breast cancer in women, with an astonishing 91% detection rate.
According to POCIT, at the age of 16, Ilok emerged victorious in the esteemed RISE program in 2022, which includes university education grants.
As part of her RISE project, she created the “CodEd” program, which offered internship opportunities, student curricula, and teacher training to enhance computer science instruction in public schools relative to private institutions.
Onyia once again wrote of her, “Emmanuela IIok has been awarded the best graduating student for Greensprings School IB.”
“I think she will choose MIT to advance her research. She is a perfect example of beauty and brains, and she is fearless!”
