My name is Mellisa Koswe, I grew up in Mutasa a rural area in Zimbabwe were girls fated to one life pathway. You reach teenage,get married, have kids and die. Most girls elope including my own sisters. Girls are taught to aspire to be housewives and receive all training intended for that. With this grim reality, it was ill-speaking of me to be dreaming of finishing high school as a girl and even worse talking about going to college.
I realized that l either had to be part of statistic or work hard to change my narrative and I chose the latter. I was born in a family of 8 and none of my siblings completed high school. My father could barely put food on the table so all my siblings dropped out of school. My three sisters were forced into marriages at the age of fourteen. My two older brothers became serious drunkards.
Being the only child left at home entailed many responsibilities. Thus my struggles involved balancing school work, house chores and going to the market to help my mother sell vegetables for my school tuition. The only time I could study was at night but that was very difficult because we do not have reliable electricity. So I had to use candles or the flashlight on my phone to study. In 2018, l wrote my Ordinary level and passed ten subjects. l went to Advanced level and I passed all 3 subjects with A’s.
Unfortunately, my parents told me that they can no longer afford to fund my University education. I had to follow suit like everyone else and get married. However, my life was given a purpose by Ms Prisca Dube when one of my friends introduced me to her. She is very humble, caring and easy to talk to. The opportunity was unbelievable and beyond my imagination but it all became real when she provided all that l need to study for SAT exam. Throughout my endeavours in education, my passion of going to college and becoming an engineer is definitely going to happen. I love mathematics the innovativeness and the creativity in it. I love figuring out problems and finding out solutions.