Wenona - 2nd Year

Mypathtolaw started from a very tender age by having a dad who is a lawyer. My biggest motivation was seeing how my dad, through hard work, discipline and the grace of God had managed to rise through the ranks and become a lawyer with his own practice. My father was born to uneducated parents, in a small rural town in northern Ghana but had worked immensely hard to become a household name that many Ghanaian lawyers look up to. Deep down, I always knew I wanted to follow in his footsteps and work with him one day.

My parents invested greatly in my schooling and sent me to a good private school where I got access to great education. I always took my education very seriously and worked hard to achieve good results. However, I struggled greatly with low self-esteem. I’ve always had a strong support system – in terms of family, friends and teachers but I always felt inadequate during most of my formative years at school. Although I did well in school, I still never thought I was clever enough.

I had decided in secondary school that I wanted to pursue my law degree in the UK. I knew I wanted to at least try and get into a top university. With hard work and support from my parents and others, I managed to put in a good personal statement and got into my top 3 choices, Exeter included. However, I felt like the grades I was supposed to achieve to get my conditional offers approved were beyond me. This was particularly for History because my school’s A level record for it had not been higher than a C in the last few years before me. I was required to get 3 As and the question I constantly asked myself was, ‘How am I going to get an A in History when nobody has gotten above a C recently’? My morale was constantly low but one thing I didn’t stop doing was being diligent. I still studied as hard as I could and I had the most amazing History teachers who kept motivating me and telling me that I could do it regardless of what the track record was. In the end, I ended up getting an A* and 2 As in my A levels, one of the A’s being in History. And most importantly, I met my offer from Exeter. This was honestly a wakeup call for me in terms of boosting my self-confidence and I realised that with hard work, anything is possible. 

My first year at university was quite tough. I found myself stressing out 70% of the time. Adjusting to the environment wasn’t difficult for me at all, I liked it from the beginning but my main issue was to do with school work. I put so much pressure on myself and I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted to in the beginning. Regardless, I knew what had brought me to Exeter and kept up those same values. In the end, I finished 1st year with a mid 2:1. I’m in my 2nd year now and I’m still working hard to achieve even better.

All these years have taught me that anything is possible once I put my mind to it. Nothing can limit you once you have the right attitude to succeed. You may doubt yourself sometimes but keep working hard regardless and the sky will be your limit. 

It is definitely not an easy journey but they say, ‘When the going gets tough, the tough get going’