Abdullah Hammed Ishola graduated as the best student in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and the overall best in the Faculty of Technology, University of Ibadan, for the 2024/2025 session, with a CGPA of 3.97 on a 4.0 scale. At age 14, he represented Nigerian at the International Physics Olympiad in Lisbon. In this interview with IndyPress Correspondent Gbayesola Samuel, he speaks about his academic feat, the habits behind it, and the challenges he overcame.

Congratulations on your feat as the best graduating student of the Faculty of Technology. To start with, how is life after school?

Life gets more serious, because you no longer have the structure the classroom gives you. In school, your days are planned for you: you have timetables, lectures and set times for everything. Outside school, it all comes down to you making those plans for yourself.

In school you can also say, “I’m still a student, I still have time.” After school, the friends you spent so much time with are all trying to figure things out on their own. There is no place where you meet anymore, and most of you barely communicate.

How does it feel to be the best graduating student of the Faculty of Technology?

Honestly, it feels normal, and I don’t say that to be proud. In previous interviews I have said that when you hold yourself to high standards, being the best graduating student is more like a gift, an appreciation of the effort you have put in. I set a certain standard for myself and kept to it consistently, so this is an acknowledgement of those years of effort.

Have you always been this way, or did you discover this version of yourself at UI?

Being at the top of my class is not new to me. From primary school I was always among those who received best-student awards at valedictory services. When I finished the BECE in JS3, I had been top of the school where I did kindergarten through junior secondary for so long that I decided to explore another school for senior secondary. I was at the top there as well.

In secondary school I represented my school in competitions. The most notable was when I represented Nigeria at the International Physics Olympiad.

Some people think a student’s background gives them an edge. Did yours play a role?

Maybe, to some extent. I am not from a rich family, but my dad taught mathematics in a government school when I was small, before moving to another role in the civil service. So you could say he was my first mathematics teacher.

Still, it depends on you. At the University of Ibadan you meet people who were at the top of their classes in various secondary schools, and along the line some of them fall off. What I have realised is that if you build yourself to always want more, and you see studying as a way of life, then a high score still feels normal. Background contributes, but it depends on you.

What influenced your decision to study Electrical Engineering?

Nothing in particular, to be honest. I get this question a lot, and my answer has always been the same.

When I represented Nigeria in physics, I met teammates at the National Mathematical Centre in Abuja, and they asked what I wanted to study. I mentioned chemical engineering. One man suggested physics, since I had an edge in it. But I had loved chemistry since SS1. People said it was hard, and I enjoy doing things others think are difficult, so I had always planned on chemical engineering.

On the day I registered for JAMB, I told the man I wanted the University of Ibadan and chemical engineering. He told me UI doesn’t offer it. I asked him to list any engineering course they do offer, and he mentioned Electrical Engineering. I said, “Put that in.” It wasn’t planned. I just decided to have fun with it.

Did you ever feel pressure to change your department?

No. In 100 level, almost all engineering students offer similar courses from the sciences, which I had enjoyed in secondary school, so it was fun. In 200 level we were still taking nearly the same courses. You enjoy it so much that you forget to ask whether something is wrong with what you are doing.

Things you never fully grasped in secondary school start to make sense at university, and you think, “This is beautiful.” So I just had fun with it.

Does a student’s secondary school background affect how they perform at university?

It does, but how much depends on the student. In secondary school, many students are under their parents, who schedule their lives: do extra lessons, go and read your book. If you cultivated those habits and enjoyed them, you can carry them into university.

But in a higher institution you have a lot of freedom. Nobody comes to your house to tell you when to read. So what intervenes is the habits you have built. Some people enjoy the freedom so much that they fall into chaos and cannot piece things back together. Our senior prefect in secondary school was like that, and he ended up going to school just for the sake of going.

Were you involved in anything besides academics?

Of course. I enjoyed my course, and once you enjoy what you are doing, about 90% of your problem is solved. The remaining 10% is perfecting things here and there.

I played football, though I am not a good footballer. In 100 level I played table tennis at one spot and with a man at the SUB. I also went to social nights and conferences. I am a social person, and you would hardly see me reading.

How did you balance all that and still maintain excellent results?

There is no formula. As I said, if you like what you are doing, your problem is 90% solved and the rest is perfection. I had cultivated the habit of studying before I came to university, and it is transferable. I know myself well enough to know how to study even difficult courses that I don’t like.

What has always worked for me is understanding what I am studying and relating it to real life. These things did not fall from heaven. Great minds made these discoveries from observations and experiments, so connecting them to real-world events makes them easier. After understanding, I try to picture the concept, because some of it is abstract. You use your mind like an artist, piecing things together. In the end you have built a system that helps you fit everything together amid the chaos of university life.

What were your major challenges, and how did you manage them?

Finances were the biggest challenge. Studies were not the major problem. I lived outside school, and some of us trekked every day from Agbowo to the Science area without missing classes. By evening you just want to sleep.

I remember a mathematics course in first semester of 300 level. The lecturer would not let anyone in after a certain time, so you had to leave home very early, with the cut-off as early as 2 o’clock. The other challenge was lecturers whose teaching style I did not connect with. It is not that I disliked them, but I had to put in extra effort.

How did you handle those lecturers and still keep your results consistent?

I am not a shy person. The university brings everyone into a classroom for a reason, so I leverage that. Even when I don’t connect with the lecturer, some classmates, not necessarily the best in the class, are following. I am friendly with everyone, so I will say, “How far, I can see you understand this. I need your help.” Some will tell you they watched a particular playlist, or that you should read a certain textbook. Others will say they followed the lecturer, so I come to them for a tutorial.

I am not an island of knowledge, and I don’t feel too big to be taught by someone else. In 200 level and early 300 level, some courses, like AutoCAD and coding, were challenging. I would leave my room for Mellanby Hall and stay there till night working on AutoCAD. When NEPA did maintenance and there was no light during the day, my friends Festus and Mubarak and I would meet at my department, which has solar power, and stay from morning till night working through past questions.

Leveraging people was one of the biggest contributors to me passing some of these courses. YouTube is not my first stop. I meet someone who understood the class and has perhaps watched a video. I don’t care how they learned it. If they understood it, they understand what the course requires. Once they teach me, I have solved 50% of my problem, and I only need to piece the rest together and have fun in my exams.

Briefly, what was your final year project about, and why does it matter to society?

My supervisor is a power lecturer, so we were tasked with solving power-sector problems for small businesses around the university. We visited bars in UI and production shops in Agbowo to see how much power they consume, so we could build a product around it.

We built a mobile power generator that runs on solar energy. Solar generators are common now, but for small businesses making less than 100,000 naira in profit a month, they are not cheap. Some cost 500,000 naira and above.

So we adopted a model similar to what telecom companies use for outdoor routers: the business does not own the device. It pays a one-time registration fee, then subscribes and pays as it goes, and we track usage. We built dynamic tariffs into that, including loyalty bonuses for subscriptions and time-of-use pricing. Because the product runs on the sun, it nudges users to run their most power-hungry equipment while the sun is out.

A mobile app comes with the product. You can track usage and set priority outlets. For example, when your purchased credit falls to a threshold you set, the app cuts off the lower-priority outlets. Everything can be configured from the app.

Where are you headed next?

That is the perfect question. I am currently serving, and I am meant to resume at one of the biggest multinational FMCG companies in about two weeks, because I finished camp last month. I also code and work remotely with startups. At the FMCG, I believe I will do more engineering and get my hands dirty with hardware.

Further studies?

Probably a master’s, but not in Nigeria. For now I want experience of how the corporate and industrial world works, and I think this NYSC year will give me that. After that, we go global.

What question about your journey do you wish people would ask you?

It is something I have touched on already: have confidence in what you come to university to study. Some people feel certain engineering courses are inferior, and I think that is a big lie. You just have to fall in love with what you are studying, and then things align.

There is a reason universities exist. You cannot sit at home and take a degree online. Some of the greatest minds put these things together, and you come here to see things from their perspective. You can only do that if you fall in love with the subject. When you do, there are opportunities everywhere, and you will make it.

In one sentence, what would you tell undergraduates who want to follow your path?

Do more, like what you are doing, leverage your classmates, pick up skills beyond what is taught in class, especially now with AI, and enjoy the process.