We choose this beauty with brains as our lady of the week, not because of her beauty but because of her enormous achievements within a short period of time.

She is Nigerian of course and she achieved great success at the age of 26. Now that is something everyone should be proud of.

Her name is Dr. Wendy Okolo and while her popularity seems to rise astronomically in the light of the Dubai robbery, I genuinely think she should be celebrated and not used as a diversion from the bad acts of those deviants.

Wendy Okolo was born to a family of six in southeastern Nigeria but what makes her stand out is her achievement as the first black woman to have a doctorate degree in aerospace engineering.

She received her BSc and Ph.D. degrees in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington in 2010 and 2015 respectively.

She was just 26 years old when she became the first black woman to obtain a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington.  She is also the winner of the 2019  Black Engineer Of The Year Award for Most Promising Engineer in United States Government.

We love her for her exceptional leadership quality and to us, she is an icon, a beacon of hope and an inspiration to all women out there especially women of African descent.  In her undergraduate, she was president of the society of women engineers in the university and as she pursued her graduate degree, she worked as a summer researcher from 2010 to 2012 in the Control Design & Analysis Branch at the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Wright Patterson Air Force Base. Where she worked with the team that flew the world fastest manned aircraft which flew from coast to coast in a jaw-dropping 67 minutes for a trip that could take some of the world’s fastest aircrafts over five hours.

Dr. Wendy  Okolo has shown by her achievements that women can also do great things.  We know it was not easy, but she made it.  You too can achieve greatness only if you aim for it.

Cheers!