Education and immigration: why Joy Chukwu-Osazuwa is one of CBC's Black Changemakers
When Joy Chukwu-Osazuwa immigrated to Canada in 2018 to start studying a fully funded PhD in marine biology at Memorial University in St. John's, she says, everything felt like a struggle.
She was almost five months pregnant with her third child, in a new city and country where she didn't know anyone and was without her husband and two other children, ages one and two, who were back home in Nigeria.
Chukwu-Osazuwa, 34, said she was trying to adapt, find a place to live and get settled in without a car while experiencing a Canadian winter for the first time.
"Just the normal person moving all the way from my country to here is not even easy," she said.
After the birth of her baby, Chukwu-Osazuwa resumed school immediately.
"PhD research is thorough work, it's rigorous. It's not easy," she said. "It was hard, very hard."
Chukwu-Osazuwa says she just took things one day at a time, and eventually the struggle got easier.
Now she's taking her experience as a newcomer to help other international students and immigrants adapt to Newfoundland and Labrador and to Canada, while helping others reach their dreams of studying abroad.
"Education changed my life," she said.
"I can't even imagine what my life would have been if not for the opportunity to come in here to study."
Chukwu-Osazuwa studied fisheries and aquaculture in Nigeria, and her doctoral work involves studying pathogens that affect fish in North America.
She's currently working on lumpfish to manage diseases that affect the aquaculture industry.
"I'm trying to develop a universal vaccine that is going to cater to all of the frequently occurring pathogens in this industry," she said.
She says it's the first time something like it has been done and there isn't a lot of already available data to guide her work.
"My work is very novel," she said, adding she hopes other fisheries researchers can build on what she's done to create a better vaccine.
Education consultant
Meanwhile, Chukwu-Osazuwa is also the director of strategy, growth and marketing with Skyned Consults, a Black-owned education technology company that helps students, primarily from Africa and some Asian countries, get into universities in Canada, the United States and United Kingdom.
The company uses an artificial intelligence-powered platform that takes a student's profile and matches them to the schools and programs they're eligible to apply for, which saves time and helps people find the right fit.
"We have a team of regulated Canadian immigration consultants and immigration lawyers that we've also partnered with that are helping the student through with their visa application, making sure that they are doing it the right way," Chukwu-Osazuwa said.
Many people outside North America don't know about the education and scholarship opportunities available in Canada and the United States, she said, and African students sometimes get swindled when dealing with the wrong education and immigration consultants.
Chukwu-Osazuwa said she's trying to ensure students have the smooth transition that she didn't have when she came to Canada five years ago.
"All of the problems that I went through with accommodation and all of that, I try, I make sure that they don't go through that," she said.
"Canada wants to bring in people who have skills, who have the experience to build the economy of the country," she said, adding that the company acts like a bridge between prospective students and schools. "It's a win-win for the person coming in and also for the country that you're coming into," she said.
Last year, she said, the company helped about 120 international students get into schools in Canada.
Social media star
Not only is Chukwu-Osazuwa a mother of three young children, a PhD candidate, working for an education tech company, but she's amassed a large social media following with advice for international students and newcomers.
On YouTube, Twitter and Instagram she covers topics for immigrants, including how to apply for a scholarship, how to access health insurance, and how to use a credit card.
Many people in Nigeria, for example, only use debit cards, not credit cards, she said.
"So if you've not travelled out of my country, you wouldn't know that you should get into the habit of … building your credit record, making sure you're being responsible about it," she said.
Chukwu-Osazuwa says it's all about sharing meaningful and useful information with people.
"I try to simplify the whole immigration process, studying abroad, try to break it down into understandable pieces."
Chukwu-Osazuwa's online videos and online advice caught Chinwe Ihejirika's attention.
The pair have never met in person, but Ihejirika calls Chukwu-Osazuwa a "virtual acquaintance" who encouraged her to study in Canada.
"When I was planning to immigrate to Canada, she was instrumental," Ihejirika said.
"She gave me a lot of free resources and a lot of useful information that helped me to actually get what I wanted to do."
Ihejirika, who is also from Nigeria, has a master's of business administration from the University of Exeter in the U.K. and came to Canada to do a post-graduate diploma in human resource management at York University in Toronto.
She said people pay immigration consultants as much as $300 an hour to access the kind of information Chukwu-Osazuwa puts online for free.
That's why Ihejirika says she nominated Chukwu-Osazuwa to be one of CBC's Black Changemakers for Atlantic Canada — because she deserves to be commended for all her efforts.
"Education, like they say, opens the door to a lot of possibilities," said Ihejirika.
Chukwu-Osazuwa said she was excited to be named a Changemaker, even though she doesn't feel she's making much change. But, she said, she must be doing something right.
"Because when you're doing something you don't know that people are watching you and people really do appreciate the little work you're doing," Chukwu-Osazuwa said.
Chukwu-Osazuwa hopes her education and doctoral studies will open doors for her in this province once she submits her PhD and graduates later this year.
"That's what my whole life has been about, fisheries, aquaculture, and I really want to get into the sector and be able to give my own contribution."
She said dreams of working for the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans and remaining in this province with her family, even though she sees a lot of international students eventually leave the province for work once they complete their studies.
"I'm really hoping that that would not be our story."
In the meantime, she said, she plans to keep helping newcomers and even wants to become an immigration consultant to help others reach for the sky.
For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.
