Bright minds from faraway lands
Simbiat Oladoja, a food scientist and entrepreneur from Nigeria and Gabriel Gonçalves, a Brazilian chemical engineer, are just two of the non-EU top talents selected for a UM Brightlands Talent Scholarship. They will research their master’s thesis on one of the Brightlands campuses in Limburg.
“So far I’ve seen only the ready-made food in the supermarket, so I can’t wait to explore the local cuisine.” Even as a child, Simbiat Oladoja was curious about food, avidly reading the nutritional value and ingredient labels as well as cultivating her own vegetable garden. She enjoyed her undergraduate degree in Food Science and Nutrition at the Federal University of Technology Minna in Northern Nigeria. Her ambition and a UM Brightlands Talent Scholarship have brought her to UM.
Simbiat calls herself a ‘nutripreneur’; besides internships and volunteer work with NGOs, she has founded a platform that provides tips on nutrition as well as personalised meal plans. “I think the personalised aspect will become more and more important. And we should move away from aesthetic fads and towards a focus on health.” To reach enough people and really make a difference, however, she felt she needed to develop her entrepreneurial credentials.
Couldn’t have done it without a scholarship
“Health Food Innovation Management is perfect for me! It combines nutrition innovation and business.” While researching the master’s programme and talking to student ambassadors, she also found out about the UM Brightlands Talent Scholarship. “I couldn’t have done it without a scholarship, and the link with Brightlands, the chance to use the facilities, develop ideas and maybe also network with entrepreneurs and researchers in industry, really appealed to me.”
While the requirements and procedure are straightforward, there were some nerves. “I knew that it’s a competitive scholarship, so I was a bit anxious, especially in front of the big panel of interviewers. But I was very well prepared and they asked really good questions.” Upon being selected, everything went very smoothly and Simbiat particularly appreciated the help she received regarding housing before arrival. “All the scholarship winners get offered accommodation through Maastricht Housing. I immediately accepted and it made things easier.”
Simbiat will have the full Limburg experience: she lives in Maastricht, will study at the Maastricht University Campus Venlo and, because of the scholarship, will also do research on a Brightlands Campus. “I think nutrition will be one of the big challenges we face and I’m excited to study and develop at the intersection of health, food innovation, and agriculture. Of course, I’m also really excited to explore Maastricht and the region. It’s an adventure!”
“Personalised nutrition and a shift from aesthetics to health will be the future of my field.”
Simbiat Oladoja, Health Food Innovation Management
Return to Chemelot
For Gabriel Gonçalves, it was less of a leap into the unknown: for the 24-year-old chemical engineer from Belo Horizonte in Brazil, the UM Brightlands Talent Scholarship marks a return. Studying at the Federal University of Viçosa, he obtained a research internship via Living Lab Biobased Brazil, a Dutch-Brazilian HEI collaboration, which led him to the Brightlands Chemelot Campus.
After two years of COVID restrictions, coming to the Netherlands was even more of an adventure. “I found the atmosphere at Brightlands really stimulating. I saw all the huge chimneys and all the companies – it was quite emotive. It makes you even more committed to doing a good job, to be a part of something much bigger than yourself.”
Gabriel remembers these months very fondly. “I really fell in love with the Netherlands. I was living in Sittard, which is quite small but it has a lot of history – there’s a church that’s as old as my country...” He also enjoyed how compact and well organised the country is and how easy that made travelling and seeing new places. The biobased materials company he was working for as an intern at Chemelot was next to the UM’s labs and classrooms. Chatting with professors and students, Gabriel quickly found that the master’s programme in Biobased Materials, taught right next door, would be the perfect next step.
Top talents for the region
“I wouldn’t have been able to pay the tuition fees and since I already felt a bit at home on the Brightlands campus, I chose to apply for that scholarship.” Gabriel describes the months waiting for confirmation as the most stressful part. “I didn’t know what would happen; that was quite tough.” He was in Amsterdam Airport Schiphol waiting for his flight back to Brazil when he found out that he would be interviewed. “Knowing that I might soon return made the journey more relaxed.”
Prior to his arrival, the scholarship office put him in touch with other recipients and with current students willing to share their experiences. “I also really enjoyed the pre-academic training; we learned about PBL and it helped to get you back into the student mind-set.” Gabriel will live in Geleen and he looks forward to meeting old friends and former colleagues. “It feels a little bit like coming home.”
One of the stipulations of the scholarship is that recipients participate in the thesis research programme (TRP), that is that they write their thesis based on research at one of the companies at the respective Brightlands campus. “For me this is ideal. The project will centre around pre-cycling and the circular economy. The Chemelot Campus is one of the best hubs for circular economy in the world; I could imagine conducting my research there even after the scholarship.”
Text: Florian Raith
“Decreasing our dependence on petroleum, not only for fuel but also as a basis for materials, will be one of our most important challenges and I hope I can contribute to that.”
Gabriel Gonçalves, Biobased Materials
Mobility is key
Mobility, both in- and outgoing, is a priority and a strength of UM, one of the most international universities in the world. International scholarships are one way to attract international talent and to accelerate the personal and academic growth of current UM students. We take a look at some of the people who have won those scholarships and their experiences.
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