My academic journey started in 2009, when I had just graduated from state school in Kananga. I was 18 years old and wanted to apply for enrollment at the Congo Protestant University in the Faculty of Medicine. I dreamed so much of attending the UPC because I had information about the good training given there. But since studies were expensive there, my parents had resolved to enroll me in the University of Our Lady of Kasai. Surprisingly, there were no more places for new candidates in medicine on the day I applied. We were discouraged.
One day, my parents were invited to a wedding party. Mom could not attend so I accompanied Dad to represent her. We met IMCK Tshikaji Administrator Kabibu, and he told us about someone who worked with a group supporting the studies of young women (Education Congo). It was then that we got to know Mr. Shafe and applied for scholarship assistance through UPC. Education Congo agreed to support me from the preparatory through the final year of medical school.
I dreamed to one day become a gynecologist and public health expert and did not want to give up my dream. In the 3rd graduate year, I experienced difficulties—needing just one more point in Physiology to be promoted. Unfortunately, this meant after spending three years in medical school, I would be unemployed.
In 2015, I enrolled in Medicine at the Vaal University of Technology in South Africa. But as medical studies are very expensive, my parents offered me to study nursing for four years instead. Being determined to become a doctor, I could not be convinced to pursue any other career. My parents and I decided that I would return to the Congo. I wanted to continue with medicine at UPC, but I thought that Education Congo had forgotten me and that my scholarship had been given to someone else. To my surprise, my name appeared on the scholarship list, and I realized that I had not been forgotten. When I returned to the UPC to reintegrate into the 3rd degree in medicine, my South African colleagues laughed at me and said that I had made the wrong decision.
I have now completed my studies as a general practitioner. I want to express my feelings of gratitude to the Shafe family and Education Congo for supporting me so much during this long academic journey!!!
Misenga Ntumba, 2022 graduate of UPC