Nigerian-American Student Rotimi Kukoyi Gets Accepted Into 15 Schools Including Harvard And Yale, Receives $2M In Scholarship Offers

Written by Ngozi Nwanji

In 2018, Rotimi Kukoyi — a high school freshman at the time — was one of the gifted students selected to appear on the “Jeopardy!” Teen Tournament.

Now, the star senior has gone on to excel even further after getting accepted into some of the top schools in the nation, according to ABC News.

Rotimi Kukoyi’s Acceptance Letters And Decision

Kukoyi has been accepted into 15 universities including Harvard University, Yale University, and Stanford University, as well as was awarded over $2 million in scholarships, per the outlet. What’s more, he’s his school’s first Black National Merit Scholar.

The Alabama teen’s inspiration to apply to the prestigious universities stemmed from being previously featured on “Jeopar

“It was a really fun experience but also put me in contact with some pretty cool students from across the country,” Kukoyi said, according to the outlet. “A lot of them are older and they’re like seniors or juniors that applied to many prestigious schools a lot of them are attending prestigious universities now. So that was kind of my original inspiration to apply to those universities.”

Kukoyi has made the decision to attend UNC-Chapel Hill, which he aims to propel him into a career in public health.

Supporting Underrepresented Minorities

The Nigerian-American student wants to help fellow students dream as big as he did regarding applying to schools. To aid in the financial barriers that minority students face when preparing for college, Kukoyi was a part of setting up free tutoring “for those in need of more academic support or resources, and for those seeking to take the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.”

“… I feel like a lot of the disparities that we see with standardized testing are because these underrepresented minorities in low income communities often can’t afford the same levels of [test preparation] that their wealthier counterparts get,” he said. “So by establishing free tutoring programs, that could kind of help to equalize the playing field.”