News & Events
SEEK Student Awarded CUNY BA Program's Edward Smith Memorial Scholarship
City Tech student Jude Poku with his mentor, Acting Dean of Arts & Sciences Pamela Brown
Readers may recall the story about City Tech student Jude Poku that appeared on the College website and in citywide and community-based newspapers in January of this year. Poku, 26, who was born and grew up in Ghana, had always been good in math and science and his father had encouraged him since childhood to become a medical doctor. He first visited New York in 1990 and moved here permanently in 1998 to experience life on his own and to pursue a medical degree.
His first two years in New York consisted mostly of long hours of work at low pay in a Downtown Brooklyn retail shop that left no time and money for schooling. Eventually, Poku learned that joining the military might be the solution. A local army recruiting office suggested that he join the reserves if he wanted to go to college. After completing basic training, he'd just have to report for duty on weekends and his college tuition would be paid.
So Poku signed up in 2000 and enrolled at City Tech in fall 2001. But his military service turned out to be anything but an uneventful weekend stint, and on September 11, 2001, only days into his first semester in college, his unit was called up to secure the site after the attack on the World Trade Center. He and his fellow reservists spent much of the following year guarding Penn Station and other public areas around the city.
Despite all this, Poku quickly demonstrated his academic ability in the classroom. Chemistry Professor Pamela Brown, now Acting Dean of the College's School of Arts & Sciences, was impressed with Poku's performance, drive and ambition. "Jude was a very good student," Dean Brown explained in the newspaper profile, "and I knew he wanted to go to medical school. I thought an opportunity for him to do research would improve his chances for admission."
So Brown asked Poku to simulate a breathalyzer (an instrument used to determine blood-alcohol levels) using materials on hand in the chemistry lab and then to develop a lab exercise so that other students could duplicate the chemical reactions involved. The project was a success and Poku's lab exercise is now part of City Tech's General Chemistry II curriculum.
Poku's work was presented by Professor Brown in March 2005 at the American Chemical Society's national meeting in San Diego, and Poku presented it at the New York Chemistry Students Association's 52nd Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium, held at Queensborough Community College in May 2004. But days later, his life again would change dramatically and his pursuit of higher education put on hold.
His reserve unit was suddenly deployed to Iraq to patrol Taji, a small town just outside of Baghdad that was heavily targeted by insurgents, and later re-deployed to Baghdad to patrol Route Irish, the main artery leading to the airport, which was a hotbed of insurgent activity.
Poku speaks with gratitude about the packages he received at the base from Professor Brown, who wrote to him and sent him biology and medical school entrance board study guides. When he returned to the base after a convoy patrol or searching homes for insurgents and weapons, he would read and study the materials and think about being in the classroom again, if he made it out alive. More than 20 of the reservists in his unit had been killed during the group's first months in Iraq.
Five months after arriving in Iraq, Poku's humvee overturned and the chest, shoulder and knee injuries he sustained cut short his tour of active duty. Once back in the States, he was able to resume his studies at City Tech as a part-time student during fall 2005 while continuing to serve at Fort Dix, NJ. He received an honorable discharge from the Army in January 2006.
Poku, who is expected to receive his associate's degree in liberal arts and sciences this coming October, recently learned that he has been awarded the Edward Smith Memorial Scholarship to continue his studies through the CUNY BA Program. Philosophy Professor Walter Brand, City Tech's CUNY BA/BS advisor, suggested to Poku that he apply for the full scholarship and assisted him with the application. City Tech will be his home college.
"With his military service behind him and the Edward Smith Memorial Scholarship in hand," says Brown, "hopefully Jude will be able to continue his education without further interruption. Jude dreams of providing medical treatment to people in developing countries. His goal is truly inspirational, as is his determination to achieve it."
6/20/06
