Ashley Adirika is a 17-year-old Nigerian-American girl who has achieved an extraordinary feat: she was accepted into all eight Ivy League schools in the US, as well as seven other top-rated universities. This is a rare and remarkable accomplishment, considering that the acceptance rates of these prestigious schools are usually below 10 percent .
Who is Ashley Adirika?
Ashley Adirika is the daughter of a Nigerian immigrant mother who came to the US three decades ago. She graduated from Miami Beach Senior High School this month, where she was a student council president and a member of the debate team. She has always been curious about how the world works and passionate about social issues. She also founded her own organization called Our Story, Our Worth, which aims to empower marginalized young women .
How did she get accepted into all eight Ivy League schools?
Ashley applied to all eight Ivy League schools – Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton and Yale – in late fall last year. She also applied to seven other universities, including Stanford, Vanderbilt and Emory. On Ivy Day, the spring day when the Ivy League schools announce their admission decisions, Ashley opened eight tabs on her computer – one for each school’s applicant portal. To her surprise and delight, she received acceptance letters from all of them .
“I just decided to shoot my shot at all of them and see if it would land. And I had no idea that I would get accepted into all of them,” she said in an interview with CNN. “On Ivy Day, I remember crying a lot and just being extremely surprised.”
Ashley attributes her success to her academic excellence, her extracurricular activities and her personal essays. She says she wrote about her identity as a first-generation Nigerian-American, her experiences with racism and sexism, and her aspirations to make a positive impact on the world .
What are her plans for the future?
Ashley chose to attend Harvard University this fall, where she plans to major in government. She says she was conflicted between Harvard and Yale, but she decided that Harvard had a better program for what she wants to do: explore policy and social policy and how they can help fix economic disparities in communities.
“I’m someone who loves to learn new things, and so debate gave me that opportunity,” she said. “But more than anything, it just gave me the platform to talk about things that I believed in and talk about things that were important to me. And so that is something that I am just forever indebted to Carol City for introducing me to that platform.”
Ashley hopes to continue being a leader and an advocate at Harvard and beyond. She also wants to inspire other young people, especially those from underrepresented backgrounds, to pursue their dreams and achieve their potential.
“Don’t let anyone tell you what you can or cannot do,” she said. “Just work hard, be yourself and go for it.”
References
: Ashley Adirika was accepted into all eight Ivy League universities – CNN
: Nigerian-American Teen Ashley Adirika Accepted Into All 8 Ivy League Universities
: Ashley Adirika is the Latest Nigerian-American Teen to be Admitted Into All 8 Ivy League Universities – BellaNaija
