IMM student Maniru Ibrahim obtains a prestigious PhD fellowship in Data Science at Science Foundation Ireland (SFI)
Maniru Ibrahim was selected by the Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Centre for Research Training in Foundations of Data Science for a fully funded PhD studentship at the University of Limerick, Ireland. This is a €20 million centre funded by SFI, Skillnet Ireland, Industry and Enterprise partners, as well as the three co-hosting universities: University of Limerick, University College Dublin, and Maynooth University. He will be attending the Ph.D. at CRT from September, 2021.
Maniru graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto, Nigeria in 2017. He applied for the International Mathematics Master and was selected to attend the first edition of the program from the fall of 2019, with a scholarship granted by the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) Office of External Activities. "I have had a wonderful time and was also trained by prestigious faculty and tutors in many mathematical fields such as Dynamical Systems, Algebraic Topology, Machine Learning, etc.".
Maniru's interest in pursuing an international PhD in Data Science was sparked by the IMM's Numerical Linear Algebra course, which contained an Artificial Intelligence component. He was particularly struck by this field and decided to base his IMM graduation thesis on the subject, supervised and supported by professor Thales Vieira of the Institute of Computing of the Universidade Federal de Alagoas (UFAL), Brazil.
"When I was about to start applying for M2 and Ph.D., I discussed with the IMM tutor, Dr. Douglas that I want to apply for about 15 places, but he advised me not to limit the number of my applications, I should just keep applying because it is very competitive. This advice helps me so much because I received over 20 rejection letters from different places. But, I didn't become discouraged, I become optimistic that something good is coming up, I just keep applying. Then, I received an invitation for an interview with CRT, I prepare so much for the interview. I passed the interview, and they gave me an offer for a fully-funded Ph.D. The amazing thing about this story is that the CRT offer that I got, is better than almost all the 20+ places that I got rejection."
"I can say that there are two most important things that I learned in this story. The first is that one should not become discouraged just because you try and failed. Secondly, always asked suggestions from someone who has experience in what you want to do. I have discussed several times with Tijana and Douglas about improving my CV and Motivational letter. Before the interview, I discussed with Prof. Thales and Douglas. This has helped me a lot.
I would like to thank Prof. Stefano Luzzatto, Prof. Thales Vieira, Dr. Sarfraz Ahmad, the ICTP, Ms. Tijana Delic, Dr. Douglas Coates and the London Mathematical Laboratory which made it possible for the IMM to be managed so well and so consistently. I am also thankful to all the wonderful faculty, tutors, and my colleagues for their outstanding support during my master's program and Ph.D. applications. I also thank ICTP for sponsoring my studies, and CUI for hosting the program. I am looking forward to staying engaged in the IMM by contributing to its activities as a proud first-generation alumni!"