Students at Spelman College were ecstatic over the scheduled appearance this month of First Lady Michelle Obama as commencement speaker. That was the case too at South Carolina State University where former Secretary of State Colin Powell is set to speak this month.
The spring commencement speaker likely to steal the show this year, when it’s all said and done however, will likely be Victor Chukwueke, an unknown 25-year-old biochemistry and chemical biology major who addressed fellow graduates of the College of Liberal Arts at Detroit’s Wayne State University on Thursday.
Chukwueke, a Nigerian who has lived in Michigan for 10 years, has spent most of his life overcoming more obstacles to living a `normal’ life than most spring commencement speakers combined. His life story is so inspiring, school officials say, they decided to make a rare exception to the long standing rule of having only the valedictorian speak from the student body.
“Victor has braved situations and challenges that would humble many and that could have instilled self-doubt or insecurity,” says Dr. Kenneth Honn, the veteran Wayne State School of Medicine pathology professor who recommended Chukwueke be invited to speak. “. . . he created goals for his personal and academic life that he has systematically achieved with self-possession beyond his years,” Honn wrote in his letter of nomination.
It was prompted by one of Honn’s research associates, Stephanie Tucker, who had marveled over how exceptional Chukwueke was in performing his volunteer work in pathology department’s research laboratory.
Most who know the aspiring neurosurgeon agree, noting that a combination of good fortune and self-determination combined to transform Chukwueke into what he calls “a new man.”
Born into a poor family in a rural Nigerian village about 100 miles from Lagos, Chukwueke developed a benign tumor during his childhood. Caused by Neurofibromatosis, the tumor grew and grew and grew on the front and top of his face and head causing severe facial deformity, discomfort and eventually costing his sight in his right eye.
