He is one of the graduands in UNILAG 2012 convocation ceremony. Ogundeko studied Mechanical Engineering and won the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) beating the rest of the world. He was the only West African students that scaled the international hurdles with bulk of the contestants from top class institutions in the United State of America.

The project was on the manufacture of solar powered refrigerator with solar tracking incorporated for optimal power generation. It emerged the winner in the Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSE) zonal conference in Ibadan but failed to shine at the national level in Calabar. Ogundeko was disappointed; he said “I felt cheated because no reason was given for the decision to drop me from the national finalists”. But today, “my case is that of a prophet without honor in his own house. After all, it was the same project that got me the ASHRAE award”

It takes a dreamer to go a step further having faced national rejection. Logically, to be rejected nationally could imply not good enough for international competition but believing in the quality of your work and taking another step again despite the first denial was instrumental to emerging ASHRAE winner.

Have you been rejected before, told not good, smart or intelligent enough by some experts? Let the story of Ibrahim Adewale Ogundeko challenge you to try again and fortune might smile on you!

I got to meet him today at the engineering project exhibition in university of Ilorin and am motivated alot, i learnt that rejected now doesn't mean rejected forever