Key Takeaways from 2024 MTN Foundation Scholarship Awards Ceremony in Enugu, Lagos and Abuja

The 2024 MTN Foundation scholarship awards ceremony recently took place in Enugu, Lagos and Abuja, where recipients across the country were awarded the prestigious MTN Foundation scholarship.

Odunayo Sanya, Executive Secretary, MTN Foundation

The three-fold event reiterates MTN’s commitment to ensuring inclusive education in the country by providing financial support to deserving students. Since 2012, 4,949 lives have been transformed through the MTN Foundation Scholarship Programme.

Here are 6 key takeaways from the events:

1. 2 Decades of Impact: MTN Nigeria Foundation has been actively supporting Nigeria education for 20 years, with focus on youth and community development. Since inception, 4,949 lives have been transformed through the MTN Foundation Scholarship Programme.

2. N300,000 Annual Scholarship: Each awarded scholar will receive an annual scholarship grant of N300,000, which covers tuition, book allowance, and stipend. This grant is renewed annually till graduation as long as the student continually meets the required benchmark. In 2024, the annual scholarship award amount was increased from N200,000 to N300,000 to further assist the students scale through their academics.

3. Diversity and Inclusion: Till date, MTN Foundation has awarded scholarships to a diverse range of students under its scholarship schemes – Science & Technology Scholarship (STSS) and Scholarship for the Blind Students (SBSS). In 2020, the UTME scholarship was added to the category, where the top 10 scoring candidates of UTME as announced by JAMB, automatically qualify for the top 10 UTME scholarship irrespective of their preferred course of study or tertiary institution.

4. Skill Acquisition: Beyond the financial commitment offered to the awardees as part of the scholarship scheme, scholars are given the opportunity to earn professional skills through learning from professional bodies and are certified thereof.

5. Breaking Barriers with MTN’s ‘W@Y Initiative’: At the Lagos State awards ceremony, the Executive Director of MTN Foundation, Odunayo Sanya, highlighted some achievements of the ‘Women at Y’ello’ initiative over the years. The ‘W@Y’ initiative, which is driven solely by female employees at MTN, also committed to providing financial support to 12 outstanding university students in their final year.

6. Achievements of an Alumni: One of the highlights of the event was when Ajah Excel, MTN Foundation scholarship alumni, took the stage highlighting his role as the convener of the Social Media Fest (SMFest), an annual social networking event aimed at bringing together creatives across Nigeria to inspire growth and assist them in leveraging the digital economy to access global opportunities. He encouraged the young scholars to strive for greatness and actively seek out opportunities within their environment, while also expressing gratitude to the MTN Foundation for its ongoing commitment to supporting youth education. He also noted that the MTN has pledged its support for the Social Media Fest (SMFest).

At the award ceremonies, the newly awarded scholars received the scholarship grant of N300,000. This will be paid annually till their respective graduation years as long as they maintain the required Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA).

Furthermore, the scholarship covers tuition, book allowance as well as stipend.

The three events had in attendance several key personalities including the MTN Foundation executives, some university Vice chancellors as well as education commissioners across the federation.