For ten years of her childhood, Juliane Lukambo lived with her family in a refugee camp in Uganda. Now, Lukambo is graduating at the top of her class at Columbus City Schools high school. She’s also won $240,000 in scholarships. Juliane Lukambo’s family was forced to flee their home country, the Democratic Republic of Congo, due to the ongoing war. She spent her early years in Uganda before moving to the United States with her family. Uganda is home to over 1.4 million refugees. Many of them are children.
A Difficult Adjustment
Lukambo’s first few years in the United States were tough as she had to adjust to a whole new culture.
“It was hard in the beginning just getting used to the language and the students,” she said in a news release from her school. “You are just thrown out there, and you have to learn to adjust to that all by yourself.”
According to her statement to school district officials, Lukambo started school as a fifth-grader at Valley Forge Elementary School. From middle school through high school, Lukambo was highly involved in several activities. She was part of her school’s STEM Club and also played soccer. She took additional classes at local colleges while maintaining high grades at school, being a part of the bowling team and landing internships. Her workload, to say the least, seemed never-ending. But it paid off. Lukambo is one of the 50 top students in her school system to earn a combined $33,172,272.00 in scholarship and aid money.
Big Dreams
“I’ve worked really hard all of these years with taking college classes, being involved, and getting the scholarships is showing recognition that I did a lot, and the reward is what I get,” Lukambo said in her statement.
Lukambo will be attending the University of Dayton to study Computer Science. Lukambo, whose favourite subject is maths, is also graduating top of her class, in addition to all her achievements.
“I think that kind of wraps everything together that I have been doing and working on. It brings it all to a close,” she said.