Damilola Sopitan

2016 Gilman Scholar

Hometown

Brownsburg, IN

Major

Psychology

College

College of Health and Human Sciences

 

It all started for me when my family decided to relocate us from Lagos, Nigeria to Indiana over a decade ago. Growing up was tough: it was hard to adjust to a new environment and culture. Even with college degrees, it was hard for my immigrant parents to find stable work. Our parents informed my siblings and me that we could be doctors, engineers, or something in the medical field. But after my first year in college, I realized that nursing wasn’t the career path for me. After transferring to Purdue University, I changed my major to psychology and haven’t looked back since.

 

For the last year and a half, I have also been involved in the African Student Association (ASA) at Purdue, an organization where new domestic and international students can meet each other and learn about different African cultures from fellow African students. ASA has brought me closer to my own culture and the love I have for my first country.

 

This summer, I will attend the Amsterdam and International Business Issues program in the Netherlands, which is a seven-week combined internship and study abroad experience. Through this program, I will have the chance to intern in the human resources departments of several businesses there and gain experience that will help prepare me for my career.

 

In the future, I want to pursue a Ph.D. in Industrial Organizational Psychology. One day I hope to go back to Nigeria to help companies manage their employees and provide a comfortable and secure workplace. Since many companies in Nigeria do not yet have a lot of diversity in their workplaces besides different ethnic groups, I also want to assist them so they will be better equipped to deal with greater diversity in the future as they hire new employees.