Two of UAE’s exceptional academic talents share their future plans
▶ Brighton College pupils vie to represent UAE at International Physics Olympiad this summer
In a great push for science and maths, the UAE’s participation in the International Physics Olympiad in Lisbon this year paved the way for extraordinary pupils to prove themselves.
In July, five of the best physics pupils from each country will face off in a 10-hour challenge split between a theoretical exam and an experiment.
Among the young physicists representing the UAE is a Brighton College pupil who has always been ahead of his time. Edward Garemo is no regular pupil; he earned the highest possible grades in several international exams – some of which he chose to sit a year early.
He achieved the highest grade worldwide in A-level computing, achieving 10 A-stars for his GCSEs. He has already sat three A-levels and will take four more by the end of the year.
“Most pupils do three A-levels. I have an innate curiosity and passion for learning, and instead of confining myself to three, I chose to pursue eight,” said the 17-year-old Swede. “I will also be graduating a year early, at the end of Year 12.”
When he is not scoring top ranks in academics or playing sport – he has a brown belt in karate and goes to the gym every day – he runs several businesses, some he started when he was 10.
“I founded a business with my younger brother at our summer house in Sweden, where we bought ice-cream in large packets and then drove in our motorboat around the archipelago selling to boats and bathers.”
The business featured in national magazines and newspapers and Edward ran it for six summers before handing the reins to his siblings.
When he was 12, he found the Swedish Cookie Company, selling organic treats at the farmers’ market in Khalifa Park. His salesmanship landed him a job at Ripe Market, where he displayed his wares for the first half of Grade 8.
He also has a tutoring business and a leadership organisation named CareerFear.
When Edward saw an opportunity to represent the UAE at the Olympiad, he applied to join without help from his schoolteachers.
“If you manage to get to this competition you prove that you are one of the best physicists in the world, and they have medals if you score above a certain percentage,” he said. “I do like testing and challenging myself, and you don’t get to do that anywhere else, this is the most prestigious around the world, there is the IMO (International Maths Olympiad) but the UAE does not participate in it, so I did physics.”
He passed the first and second qualification exams, scoring third place overall in the UAE.
Also proving her exceptional academic skills is Dami Adekeye, who is also from the Abu Dhabi school.
Not only has the 17-year-old received offers from 19 of the world’s leading universities, the Yale University admissions officer in Connecticut sent a handwritten note: “Your school thinks the world of you and so do we!”
After scanning universities for months, and visiting some of them in the US, Dami had to narrow her 50 options to 20.
Her preparation proved successful when she received her first acceptance letter, from York in England, last December.
“York was one of my top choices and it was my first acceptance, so you develop a special connection to it, so I was really happy and went screaming to my parents,” she said. Her 19th acceptance letter came from Stanford in California on April 1. That is one of her two top choices.
“I have not decided yet which one I will go to yet, debating between Yale and Stanford, those were always my favourites.”
She has yet to settle on a major but said she is leaning towards international relations and economics.
“When I first came to the UAE in 2011, I was 10, and I’ve been living my whole life in Houston, Texas, so it was a culture shock at first, but quickly turned into a way for me to understand different cultures,” said the Year 13 pupil.
“And we have such a wide student body here at Brighton, so that opened my mind more to the world and made me see things with a different perspective.”
York was one of my top choices and it was my first acceptance, so I was really happy and went screaming to my parents DAMI ADEKEYE Brighton College pupil