Wami Ogunbi opens up about the importance of advocates and mentors in enabling her to achieve—and delivers a message about the importance of inclusion.

BY:
MICHIGAN ENGINEERING
Oluwami (Wami) Dosunmu-Ogunbi, the first Black woman to earn a U-M Robotics PhD, will speak at today’s University-wide commencement ceremony.
Many PhD students start programs without a clear idea of their end goals, and Ogunbi owns to being one of them. As she tells it, it was the hat—a hexagonal velvet beret with a golden tassel—that sold her on dedicating half a decade or so to the research enterprise after wearing her bachelor’s mortarboard. But now, as she graduates, she sees opportunities to use her engineering knowledge to improve the lives of other people.
“A Michigan Engineer is one who does not just provide scientific and technological leadership,” she said at the engineering graduate student commencement ceremony last Wednesday, “but also is one who is intellectually curious, socially conscious, creates collaborative solutions to societal problems, and promotes an inclusive and innovative community of service for the common good.”
The daughter of Nigerian immigrants, she came to U-M’s mechanical engineering PhD program decorated with academic honors—such as her MVP award from the University of Illinois’ Pi Tau Sigma chapter, the mechanical engineering honor society. But she failed her qualifying exams in the mechanical engineering PhD at U-M program.