By Brian Zanzonico
"She'd say, 'Maybe when I grow up and am more advanced, I can find cures for things like cancer and AIDS,'" said Adewuyi, an emergency room doctor in Far Rockaway. "She used to think anything was possible with science."
Years later, Adenike, now 18, has taken a giant step toward a career of saving lives. On Sept. 10, the Sewanhaka High School class of 2005 valedictorian will pack up the family truck, which already has a Harvard University decal on its rear window, and leave Elmont for Cambridge, Mass., to begin a biomedical engineering program Harvard offers jointly with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
She enters school next month with 1,500 of the brightest incoming freshman minds in the country. Many will have duplicated her 1450 SAT score and the exhausting number of clubs she belonged to in high school. But Adenike's path to one of the most prestigious universities in the world is as unique as her name, which means "the crown is loving, affectionate" in her native Nigeria.
She was born in Ibadan, the capital of Oyo State in southwest Nigeria, a country with an average life expectancy of 40 years. She had a happy childhood, and especially loved school, oblivious to the military rule Nigerians were forced to live under.
Adenike's father studied medicine and her mother, Florence, physical therapy. In 1994, he finished his residency and went to Scotland to practice medicine. A year later, Florence was offered a job in Texas and worked in McAllen until 1996, returning to Ibadan to get Adenike and her brother, Adeyemi, who were living with family friends.
"I remember being in the airport in Texas and seeing an escalator for the first time and saying, 'Mommy, look at those stairs moving,'" Adenike said.
Her father joined the family in Texas and they stayed in McAllen for six months, enrolling Adenike in the third grade. Eventually they moved to Lubbock.
Adenike said her transition to a new culture was rather seamless, aided by the fact that English is the primary language in Nigeria - which was once under British rule - meaning she didn't require English as a Second Language classes. The one shock she received was observing Americans' seeming lack of respect for their elders. In Nigeria, anyone five or more years older than you is addressed as uncle or aunt even if there is no relation. To greet grandparents and older relatives, Nigerians kneel at their feet, something she never saw any of her new American friends do.
After a year in Texas, Adewuyi got a job in Queens and the family moved to New York. They spent the first 12 months living with relatives in Queens Village, where Adenike attended PS 34, John Harvard School.
"Texas is calmer, soothing," Adenike said. "New York is fast-paced. And the weather in Texas is like Nigeria."
New York gave the girl who grew up 15 degrees north of the equator a hearty introduction to snow during one of the whitest winters on record. "I learned one thing from that winter -- wear layers," she said, noting how fierce New York winters have prepared her for the harsh New England cold.
After a year in Queens, the family moved to Elmont, and Adenike was enrolled in Gotham Avenue School. From there she went on to Sewanhaka, where she exhibited an early brilliance, taking A.P. physics as a sophomore. She excelled in all her major subjects and, beyond her studies, her commitment to God and the choir and keyboard at her beloved Gospel Faith Mission International in Hollis, Queens, she found time for student government, student council, Key Club, Mathletes, the National Honor Society and Students Against Destructive Decisions. Always laughing and never without a smile, Adenike's gregariousness also earned her many friends and opportunities to socialize -- and therefore many opportunities to slip up. Though there was always the temptation to drop everything to be with her friends, Adenike said it was simple for her to strike a balance between academician and average teen.
"My faith in God. I put God first," she said. "I wasn't just looking at the present, but at the future. How will this decision benefit me later?"
Lost in the shuffle
In 2003, the Adewuyi family received their Alien Registration Receipt Card, known as "green cards," documents provided to permanent residents of the U.S. who do not have citizenship. Brother Adewale, who was born in the U.S., didn't need one. Everyone got their card except Adenike, who said she was in the government file and even had an alien registration number, but no card. "She got stuck in a web," her father said.
He tried for almost two years to get answers and a resolution from the Immigration and Naturalization Service, to no avail. In March 2005, he contacted Assemblyman Tom Alfano. "Like many constituents, Adenike's parents wrote a letter to my office," Alfano said. "I called them and got more information on her problem. It was obvious this was a bureaucratic snafu and nothing more. Unfortunately, these kinds of problems can mushroom, and she was apparently lost in the system. I worked with Congressman Peter King in working with INS, the FBI, Homeland Security and other agencies to get all of Adenike's paperwork together."
Adenike, busy applying to major universities, was able to provide an alien registration number, but some schools required a photocopy of a green card for financial aid. Though Harvard, her top choice, didn't require a copy to be eligible for financial aid at the $40,000-plus-per-year school, others did. And she needed that card, since there was always the chance she would not get into Harvard.
"After a lot of legwork, and frustration sometimes, we were able to straighten everything out," Alfano said. "She's on her way to Harvard. I'm so pleased they wrote to me to see if I could help."
By the end of March, the Adewuyis were able to exhale. "For two years, nothing happened," Aderemi Adewuyi said. "My assemblyman calls and he's able to get it for us in a couple of months. We thank him."
Adenike was accepted to 13 schools, chief among them Yale, Princeton, Columbia and Cornell. But it was Harvard's esteemed biomedical engineering program that she desired, which none of the other schools offered.
"I liked Princeton, but they only had traditional engineering," she said. "Biomedical engineering is a relatively new field. It's where engineering and medicine meet. Like the technology of the pacemaker, matching the pace of the machine to the heart."
Harvard-bound
Adenike was in class the day her thick envelope arrived from Harvard. Her parents, excitedly violating Sewanhaka school policy, called Adenike on her cell phone and shouted the good news. "It was unbelievable -- it still is unbelievable," she said.
Adenike must take two years of core classes before diving headlong into biomedical engineering, but it won't be long before the third Adewuyi enters the medical field. "We're very happy, very proud," said her father, whose wife recently received her doctorate in physical therapy from Stony Brook. "We always told her, 'You can achieve anything.'"
Adenike plans to be as busy at Harvard as she was at Sewanhaka. She wants to try out for the tennis team and join the Harvard-Radcliffe Christian Fellowship. And she wants to get acquainted with the greater Boston area, her new home, one she's traveled thousands of miles to get to.
"Think about it: She had a goal, worked to achieve it and is on her way to Harvard," said Alfano. "Sewanhaka High School should be real proud of what she has earned and achieved. She is a leader that will make a difference in medicine. What a story, and what a fine young lady."
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