Нигерийский аспирант стал первым в истории науки обладателем стипендии Бейлорского университета

Nigerian Ayodeji Felix Isarinade has been awarded the 2026 Armstrong Browning Library Teaching Fellowship at Baylor University, Waco, Texas, United States, where he is a geosciences doctoral student and a graduate teaching assistant. From the information gathered from the university’s website, the fellowship aims to encourage the use of the library’s collections in Baylor graduate and undergraduate curricula and is open to full-time Baylor faculty members and graduate teaching assistants. Isarinade, through his recent LinkedIn post, stated that since the inception of the fellowship in 2015, he is the only student from the sciences awarded the fellowship, a claim verified by Saturday Tribune from the university’s fellowship website. He further stated that the fellowship demonstrated institutional recognition of his ability to apply interdisciplinary scholarship by extending the educational use of a humanities special collection into geoscience education. “Through the fellowship, I developed instructional resources that integrate earth science, history, and primary-source analysis, thereby broadening the educational applications of the Armstrong Browning Library’s collections and promoting interdisciplinary teaching and learning,” he added. He stated in the post that, as part of the fellowship programme, he developed a collection-based teaching module titled ‘Discovering deep time: Victorian reactions to geological time’. “The project examined the historical development of the geological concept of deep time and its influence on scientific, religious, and intellectual thought during the Victorian era,” he added. READ ALSO: Food security not about producing more; it’s about access, sustainability — Dorcas Sunday, US-based Nigerian doctoral student He appreciated the staff and management of the Armstrong Browning Library and Museum for their support, professionalism, and commitment to creating an enabling environment for teaching, research, and scholarly engagement. Ayodeji Isarinade also shared via LinkedIn that, in 2025, he was one of the scholars who benefited from the EducationUSA Nigeria Opportunity Fund Programme (OFP), shortly after he graduated from the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Oyo State, where he finished with a First Class from the Department of Pure and Applied Mathematics. “As an OFP scholar, EducationUSA Nigeria paid for my flight from Lagos to Waco, Texas, US, having secured a fully funded direct PhD admission at Baylor University,” he stated. The OFP supports high-achieving students with strong academic performance and leadership potential to pursue United States higher education opportunities. The programme covers essential upfront costs, including associated standardised testing fees, application fees, and other related expenses. Isarinade revealed that at the Geosciences Department of Baylor University, his doctoral research involves integrating mathematical modelling with artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and deep learning (DL) to partition fast and slow flow in mountain basins and other complex real-world problems, particularly in hydrology and hydrogeology, under the supervision of Dr Marcelo Somos.