Source: University of Auckland
In spite of many financial and health challenges, Igor Felippe received his doctorate at the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences’ December graduation ceremony this week.
Growing up in Brazil, Igor Felippe would never in his ‘best dreams’ have imagined getting a bachelors degree, let alone a PhD from Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland in far-off Aotearoa New Zealand.
Yet, in spite of many financial and health challenges, Igor is receiving his doctorate at the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences’ (FMHS) December graduation ceremony, along with more than 700 other medical students.
“I have no words to stress how privileged and honoured I feel,” he writes in the Acknowledgements section of his thesis.
“I remember when I was 13 years old and was used to look at the future with no expectations ahead,” Igor writes. “During that time, studying at a University in Brazil was a significant accomplishment; it was not something for everybody.
“On my mother’s side of the family, only one aunt had a bachelor’s degree, and on my father’s side, my relationship with them was somewhat limited.”
Back in FMHS, Igor relates how the time when he was 13 was one of particularly severe financial hardship for himself and his mother, in his home town of Vitoria.
He had to move to a state primary school, which, although he enjoyed it, wasn’t a good school. His mother would come home from work and bake pastries in the evening for Igor to sell the next day to help pay the bills.
“I would study in the morning from seven to noon, and then, in the afternoon, I would come home, warm up the pastries, put them in a thermal bag and I would walk around my neighbourhood, selling them to stores to help pay our bills.”
Their situation improved when Igor successfully competed in an exam that gained him a scholarship to attend a private high school. While that improved his chances of going to a public university, which in Brazil are excellent but hard to gain entry into, he still thought that would be too difficult.
To his surprise, he competed against 1,550 students in an exam and managed to win one of only fifty places in a federal university. Igor went on to get a bachelors and then a masters in Pharmacy.
While he was a masters student, Igor met the director of the Centre for Heart Research Manaaki Manawa, Professor Julian Paton, at a conference and Julian invited him to Auckland. He then gained a scholarship to do a PhD at the University. However, arriving with only funding from a scholarship and living in halls provided more challenges.
“I had some problems with money. I would try to save on groceries. I could only have lunch and dinner. You could go out sometimes to a pub. But, if you go out one week, it’s like I don’t have much money any more. And then there were health problems.”
Just as the pandemic started, Igor was diagnosed with an upper airways respiratory disease. It affected his voice and required several surgeries. He had to go through them without any family support.
Meanwhile, back home, his grandmother and uncle died and he was unable to attend the funerals, which was very sad and difficult.
However, Igor continued to achieve academically, winning six prestigious national and international awards in the past two years for his doctoral research in the Department of Physiology.
Manaaki Manawa director Professor Julian Paton describes Igor as a ‘rising star’ in research, who, despite setbacks, handed in his thesis on time.
The future is looking bright for Igor who is now working as a researcher in Manaaki Manawa on a three-year contract, studying the carotid body.
Best of all, finally he travelled back to Brazil this year and caught up with his mother and family.
