Blogging My Way Through Uni

So I turned 22 over the Easter break! Thanks to everyone for all the birthday wishes. It has been a relatively quiet month with the exam season fast approaching and the last term of university poking around the corner. However, this month has had its perks...

📢 Progress w/ Scholarship Campaign 📢

As well as branching out to tackle the broader issues faced by migrants in the UK, the Let Us Learn Campaign is making great progress with our main mission which is making access to higher education an equal opportunity to all young people in the country.

We have made great progress in terms on getting London universities on board by opening up new scholarship schemes as UCL already have. Recently, a meeting was held with the student union here at Imperial College London who seem keen to take things forward. Nottingham Trent, Leeds, Northampton, Sheffield Hallam and Huddersfield have also been contacted as we look to spread out influence outside of London.

🔬 The Crick Institute 🔬

 The Crick Institute is a hub for biomedical research made up of researchers from UCL, Imperial and the Medical Research Council. I was lucky enough to be selected as one of the 36 interviewees out of around 400 applicants for a summer placement at the Crick Institute. Unfortunately, I didn't make it past the final interviews that day but it was an insightful opportunity, it was also an honour to interact with the researchers there for the day. 

Most of the month has been spent with family and friends as well as revising for the exam season ahead. I hope you are all enjoying the bank holiday and best of luck to all those with exams coming up in the following months!

P.S. My TEDxEastEnd Talk has uploaded on youtube now. Enjoy!

And just like that the second semester is done! It feels as though time is flying by, this time last year, I wasn't even sure whether I would be at university. And now, first year is nearly over!

If you would like to know what I have been up to this semester, start reading the blog from the January entry. March has been one of the most exciting month so far. That will be because of...

*drum roll*

Maya 2016

Maya - a theatrical production put together by the Malaysian Society at Imperial - was such a brilliant experience. I decided to buy tickets on a whim after a few friends (mainly my lab partner) convinced me to go along. I am glad I made the decision! The show was so well put together and considering the amount of people involved it was an absolutely amazing achievement by the Malaysian Society. 

The production detailed the rise of a young app developer whose rise to fame was haunted by his guilt and driven by his business partners' greed for more money (with a Malaysian twist). The audience were also treated to amazing bursts of performance art, my favourite can be viewed below.

Spanish!!!

At Imperial, we get the choice of picking an extra subject for degree credit, an ancillary subject. I decided to do Spanish every Tuesday as my ancillary course and I've loved it! We had our final exam on the last day of term and it went really well!

Glad to have had the opportunity to improve my Spanish whilst at university. Stay tuned for how those exams went (I have a feeling I did quite well!). Strictly speaking there will be one more oral examination before the Spanish course is done but I am glad that it is approaching an end. Having classes till 6 on Tuesday (even for amazing Spanish classes) was quite demanding.

Vitality North London Half-Marathon!
For those who read my last few blogs, you might be well aware that I have been training for another half-marathon. I didn't quite reach my target time of under 1 hour and 30 mins but I did manage to get a new PB of 1 hr 35 mins 24 sec! As a team, we managed to raise over £3,000 for Just for Kids Law - a charity that helps to represent and support young people with their legal battles.

I would like to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported us so far and to also highlight the fact that it is not too late to do so if you haven't had the opportunity:
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/just_for_kids_law

A picture of Just for Kids Half-Marathon Team with our medals!

Leadership Training w/ Citizen's UK (AGAIN :D)

Casting you back to the first semester, I attended a two-day leadership training programme hosted by CitizensUK (an organisation that provides a platform for other campaigns to bring about positive change in their communities) where we were given training to improve our skills of storytelling, negotiation and ability to organise alongside others with a common cause. 

This was built upon in another successful training session that has seen the "Let Us Learn" team grow from strength to strength. The focus of the last training session was to lead up to the upcoming mayoral elections where we plan to question the candidates (Zach Goldsmith and Sadiq Khan) on their views on migrants in London.

They will host an audience of about 6,000 people at the Copperbox in the Olympic Village and I take this opportunity to openly anyone who wants to attend as a guest of mine (feel free to get in touch).

Can't Forget Easter!!!