My 2024 Story

Last year I didn't write a 2023 story because my 2024 only started until August this year. It was the year where I had not even thought of any resolution and faced a difficult period. 

Last year March, I knew that I would need a sponsorship or another type of visa to be able to stay and work in the UK. So I started applying for different jobs to be able to land sponsorship and all came back with a rejection. I think about 11. So I reflected and thought of trying other pathway. So I started with a founders innovators visa pathway. I worked on the application from September 2023  up until December 2023. I gathered multiple pieces of evidence, spent nights building prototypes, conducting market research, and financial projections but it came back with rejection in January 2024. 

I tried Global Talent Research too, gathered nearly 1222 pages worth of evidence and that also came back with a rejection a week after I received that of founders innovators. 

So with the support of a mentor, I jumped on Global Talent Tech, worked on all my evidence, and still got rejected. By the time I was done, I had already spent a lot of money and burnt out. In between I had applied for two roles, my current role and another in Glasgow. One came back with a rejection and the other I did my interview in anxiety and presentation as well. I was extremely miserable. I had only about a week on my Graduate visa. I was a total disaster and mess at this period and I was close to going back home until a friend came through for me, and sought legal advice (can't still share the full story here at the moment). For the next 6 months, I was in limbo, I could not leave the country and every night I had sleep with deep anxiety and it was one of the most terrifying moments of my life. In fact, I was sick in between and was scared to even visit the hospital, thinking it may affect my visa situation. There were things that happened within those period that I hope I found the courage to share someday. 

To cut the story short, I later got a visa and despite going through all of this, I never stopped building and never stopped developing. I was constantly working on my initiatives and even taking advantage of opportunities. I will attend pitches and funders meetings without showing that I was going through things. Even in the face of difficulties, I was able to do the following 

1. Selected for the London Business School Launchpad Accelerator for those with brilliant ideas to scale 

2. Came second in the Western Union Foundation Fellowship and got a $5000 seed prize 

3. Featured by the Western Union with over 800k views on social media and spoke at the Western Union Office in London about Skill2Rural Bootcamp. 

4. Selected for the fully funded Summer School on the Industry of Education in Conflicts hosted by the center of Lebanese studies at Homerton College, Cambridge. I also presented Skill2Rural Bootcamp approach in supporting internally displaced young people with 21st-century skills. 

5. Built and launched an Edtech platform that now has over 300 users with over 144 educators reaching 100k+ young people and democratizing access to 21st cent-century skills. 

6. Selected as a Brandtech Impact AI scholar to attend the  One Young World Summit in Canada and building an AI career plan solution

7. Got a new role as the Transitions Coordinator with the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Programme at the University of Edinburgh 

8. Selected for the Nudge Global Impact Challenge and traveled to the Netherlands for the Learning Experience 

9. Became a Salzburg Global Fellow and attend the Future of Teaching Seminar in Salzburg, Austria 

10. Nominated for the Future Awards Africa for professional service and traveled to Nigeria to experience it. 

11. Worked as a Facilitator at the Rise Residential Summit and performed one of my poems at the opening ceremony. 

12. Did 3 major poetry performance and including a paid one. 

13. Did paid facilitation on storytelling and gave a keynote at the University of East Anglia on the same topic, and even recorded a podcast on it. 

14. Started posting short reels about topics I am passionate about and reaching almost 300k impressions every week on social media. 

15. Won the team Principals Medal at the University of Edinburgh for our work on the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program. 

16. Travel to 3 countries in Europe and North America and more trips scheduled for the coming year. 

17. Delivered several free talks on storytelling and other development-related topics. 

Someone once said, you are traveling everywhere and I wished they knew where I was some months ago. For the first 8 months this year, I could not even dare to travel even I lost money for the paid vacation I was about to go on with my friends but I am grateful to Almighty Allah that the year ended the way it is and if there is anything I have learned nothing great comes without pain. Pain is joy and joy in itself is war and taking responsibility without pathologizing our lives is a way to stand up even in the face of difficulty. 

I am still processing the stories and it is the reason why I left some parts out but I am grateful for being and becoming at the same time. Looking forward to the next hurdles.