Social Work Spotlight - International Episode 22: Emmanuel (Nigeria)

Episode Date: June 20, 2026

In this episode I speak with Emmanuel, an early-career social work researcher from Nigeria, at the intersection of migration and mental health, with a bachelor’s degree in social work and a master's degree in migration, and a strong interest in research.Links to resources mentioned in this week’s episode:Emmanuel’s published works on ORCID - https://orcid.org/0009-0002-2029-5857Emmanuel’s ResearchGate profile - https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Emmanuel-Onyemaechi-Ugwu?ev=hdr_xprf Dibia Akwukwo Social Solutions Research Group - https://www.linkedin.com/company/social-solutions-research-group-ssrg/posts/?feedView=allThis episode's transcript can be viewed here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HRYWc2xZMFknYIGZyjpCJZ3iFGRbiSEMLjn6J_kDHRE/edit?usp=sharingThanks to Kevin Macleod of incompetech.com for our theme music.

Before beginning, I wish to acknowledge the traditional owners of the countries of guests featured in this podcast and acknowledge their continuing connection to land, waters and community. I pay my respects to the First Nations people, the cultures and the elders, past, present and emerging. Hi and welcome to Social Work Spotlight where I showcase different areas of the profession each episode, with a 12-month focus on social workers around the world as of August 2025. I'm your host, Yasmin Lupus, and today's guest is Emmanuel, an early career social work researcher from Nigeria at the intersection of migration and mental health with a bachelor's degree in social work and a master's degree in migration. With a strong interest in research, Emmanuel is currently applying for acceptance into a PhD program in Germany.

Hi, Emmanuel, lovely to meet with you today. Thank you so much for chatting with me about your experience with social work so far. Yeah, thank you, Yasmin, for the opportunity to be part of your podcast. Yeah. I'd love to know firstly when you got started with social work, what got you into it and when was that? I think it was 2016. That was when a cousin of mine told me about the profession for the first time. I didn't know about it and then after he told me I read a lot about social work, the aims, the objectives, and the core principles. And I just understood that they aligned with the kind of person I am. So I thought, okay, this is what I should do. And then I had to write the necessary

examinations. And then I found myself in the university studying social work for the first time. Yeah. And honestly, it's been, it's been very fulfilling. I think it's one of the best decisions I made and every other thing that followed has been about a journey, a personal journey, a professional journey, and then, you know, getting to know people, colleagues, professionals in a way that I never thought it would be. So it's been a great experience, actually. And is your cousin in something related or are they a social worker themselves? Not really. He's not a social worker. He is a microbiological. Okay.

Yeah, but he just got to know about the profession before me. And he thought that because I was social sciences inclined right from my high school education, he thought it would be a good feat for my further education. So I guess that's why he shared the information with me. Nice. And is this in Nigeria where you studied? Yes. I studied for my bachelor's in social work in Nigeria.

So I got a BSE from the university. of Nigeria. So that was between 2016 to 2021. So that's when I got my bachelor loss. Yeah. Okay. So you were during COVID that must have been quite disruptive. Exactly. It was. I was enrolled in 2016. So I was supposed to extraculate in 2020, but because of the pandemic, it was shifted to 2021. One year was lost, but it was also one year of indoor learning and collaboration and a lot of things. So not that bad. How did you stay motivated? How did they keep you busy during that time? You know, a lot of things were online. Even even the things that we never thought would be possible to do online prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, we saw possibilities in a

lot of things. So a lot of improvisations. So I stayed connected to my peers, to colleagues, to my mentors, you know, through online platforms and we were also collaborating on doing research, trying to collect data from co-researchers through digital platforms. So it was kind of motivating for me, realizing that despite the pandemic, we could still do social work-oriented things. So that was just it. And is the structure of your degree similar to Australia and many other places where you have sort of your core subjects at the beginning of the degree and then the final years

are taken up by placements. You have sort of practical elements. Yeah, it's a bit different, just slightly different because in Nigeria, I don't know for all the universities in Nigeria, but for my university, the University of Nigeria, we practice concurrent placement. So we continue to be on placements from first year to final year. So the structure is that for every semester, there is a placement incorporated for the rest of the program. So for the whole four years, my bachelor was for four years. So each semester of those four years had a placement. So I think it was a kind of, it was an intensive kind of placement. But it was also something that equipped us a lot, like a lot of experience from different social

agencies. So it's rotational, right? So every semester, you go to a different agency. For instance, in some semesters, I was in a hospital for my placement. In other semesters, I was with the welfare agency. The other one, I was with the correctional institutions and it continued like that from beginning to end. Yeah. And were there some sort of key learning experiences or maybe some mentors that you had that really solidified this is the right choice that I've made to study social work? Yeah, of course, of course. And one thing I like about it is that I saw fulfillment in the things they did. So when I, when I started, I didn't necessarily have mentors, just my instructors, my lecturers at the university, but I was kind of looking up to the things they were doing

right from my bachelor's, I already started having interest in doing research, in doing social research because I was looking at their research engagements. I was looking at, you know, how they did it and not just the research, but every other thing they did. Some of them that were practicing and some of them that were doing international collaboration in terms of international social work and all of that. So that was a conviction for me that I made the right choice. But honestly, At some point I was kind of ambivalent, like, am I supposed to do this or not? But I guess that's because I was here to have full knowledge and experience of the profession. You know, but to my final year, when I graduated, I understand that, yeah, I really made the right decision.

And to date, I am grateful for that decision. Yeah. And it sounds like there might have been a bit of imposter syndrome in there as well, which is very, very common at all stages of the profession. in terms of what skills and ability and learning do I have? What difference can I make? I don't know if I'm the right person. There's a lot of doubting, I think, and that's completely normal. Exactly.

That was exactly what happened. And I guess this is the same thing that happened to a lot of my colleagues because we kept asking questions. Are we really doing the right thing? Some persons even ask questions like, where is this leading us to, especially, you know, given the fact that in Nigeria, social work is not recognized to the extent it would be recognizing in Australia, for example. Okay.

This is not a negation of the profession, but in terms of the incorporation of the profession in policies and in governance. So it's not been so long. it's not been a really long time. I think about three years ago that the profession was institutionalized. It's got licensed like you could officially get a license. So I guess that's why some students were acting that question. But yeah, all the questions they asked were invalidated by the experiences that followed. I mean, social work as a concept wouldn't be new in Nigeria and many countries around the world in terms of supporting people working with policies, working with

legislation, working with people. But as you're saying, it's sort of a newer, recognized profession in that sense. What is your understanding? What have you learnt about the history of social work in Nigeria and what's the state of it now in terms of that recognition, do you think? The recognition has made a lot of difference, right? Because the The origin of social work in Nigeria is the one I would describe as turbulent as not really easy because a lot of people did not have a good understanding of the profession. And that's also because the profession is relatively new in Nigeria. So unlike other ones, the popular professions like law or medicine and

whole lot of other ones because social work is new people tend to confuse it with psychology so for instance when you tell people that you're studying social work as a student they usually ask you you are studying social work what are you studying it with is it social work and psychology or social work and sociology and then you say no it's just social work you know a profession and they are like oh Okay, interesting. And then that signals that they do not really have a deep understanding of the profession. So that's the thing that continued for a long time before the professionalization. But since the professionalization, people have better understanding because there is more awareness. And this is reflected in the things that students do, not just students, but also educators and practitioners.

So it's made a lot of difference right now. So I would say the beginning was not quite easy. It was met a lot of misinterpretation of the profession. But right now it's mitigated to a significant extent. That's great. But it would have been born from a need to support people with war and natural disasters and everything that happens in parts of the world where people are vulnerable and people need support. So what were those people known as before they were social workers?

What did people refer to them as and how were they able to help within the system? I think people that did that prior to social work in Nigeria were mostly missionaries. Yeah. They were religious clerics or evangelists or people that had one thing or the other to do with religion, especially Christianity. And this is also why in some places in Nigeria that I talked about before this professionalization, people always see social workers as those working with non-governmental organization

or kind of faith-based or charity organizations. Because what they knew earlier before the emergence of social work was that. So those people that provided community, support, community awareness, you know, that give aids and arms to people in need or in times of war where mainly missionaries. And apart from missionaries, because Africa is very collectivist, communities also provided their own support. So communities would always join hands together to support the most vulnerable ones, starting from the family units down up to villages and communities. So that was how people, that synergy from the support that people in need received.

But that was also together with some missionary. So I guess that's what Nigerians or maybe other Africans understood social work to be, or mistook it to be in those days. Yeah, a few episodes ago, I spoke with someone from Botswana and she was talking about that collectivist mission and the support that communities provide each other. And I guess there's a risk there though that services, NGOs or even government services might be reluctant to step in because either they think they're stepping on people's toes or maybe those supports are already there informally. So that might cause problems as well as be really helpful for people. Yeah, you have a point, of course, but it completely depends.

on the assessment, right? Because if the government or other necessary agencies are supposed to provide help to communities or to individuals, it's not just about assumptions of what people need. There has to be an assessment of what people need. So when you do that kind of assessment, you definitely understand that even though it seems people already have the help they need, they might not have it. Because the truth is, even though Africa is very collectivist, which is very nice, one thing is that the support that emanate from that collectivist lifestyle is to a significant extent informal. So it's informal support rather than formal.

So while that informal support is there to complement formal support, it does not take away the fact that formal support is very necessary because there are some things that informal support cannot take care of. So the government definitely needs to come in at every point. But for some reasons, some complicated situations, it doesn't happen sometimes. Yeah. Okay. In your experience, is it social workers who tend to be completing those assessments for services or material aid, that sort of thing?

Well, it's not social workers. Even if it's social workers, then that should be lately. because from what I talked about earlier, the social work profession is not that recognized because it's new. So people who occupy spaces in that assessment platform we are talking about right now, the much I know should be, for the most part, it should be psychologists, for example, because the situation in Nigeria is that you have a lot of people at the helm of a who might claim that they have the expertise to do everything just because they are in that privilege position to do so.

So you see self-aclaimed social workers or people who just feel like because they have a degree in psychology or because they have a degree in economics, they can do everything and they can even do better than social workers. And then qualified social workers may not have the opportunity to occupy such spaces because there is the issue of non-recognition. So it's not social workers doing the assessment. I mean, I don't have statistics, but I know from my education and from my personal experience that it might be just one social worker in 10 people or one in 20 in such situations. So where are social workers in Nigeria working? Where do they tend to get jobs? Is it those NGOs that are more

traditional in those sort of helping professions or are there government roles that people are looking for? I feel that social workers in Nigeria are mostly in academia. Okay. Or doing independent research. All right. This is the situation. Of course, there are social workers too who are into real practice, like with the welfare, with hospitals, with psychiatric facilities.

social workers also work there, but I feel that the extent to which they work in some of these practice-based organizations are not as much as they do in academia and research. So this is what I think, because there are a lot of organizations, a lot of major organizations in Nigeria where social workers should be playing very important and key roles, but they are not there not because they don't want to be there but because they do not really have the opportunity or perhaps the political way we do to occupy those spaces yeah so they work in other organizations but not that much but many of them are lecturers you know professors and researchers yeah i might be wrong i might not be right all the time but

yeah, this is what I know and yeah. Okay. And so that's, I guess, what has maybe led to you wanting to do research and to understand a little bit more about what social work can add to different settings. How did you get into research? You've done a master's. You're looking at a PhD, hopefully soon. What have you been focusing on? Well, it's a bit different because my own situation is not the same. It's not because I could not practice social work, but because I had a personal experience that made me realize that I really want to do research. So when I was studying for my bachelor's, for example, I wasn't really thinking about doing research. I wasn't thinking research

all the time, but it was because of a personal thing, a personal experience in 2019. And that experience was like a self-discovery for me and i discovered that okay i want to understand more about this experience as regards other people so i want to see how people experience what i've experienced and how they cook with it and that's how i found myself being so interested in doing mental health research so that was my motivation to do research but even before that i had lecturers and mentors who were doing research. So that's also kind of you open me, exposed me a bit to research methods or at least what doing research felt like. So I guess that's just how I ended up in this lane. And was your master's degree by research or was it coursework? It was a top master's

but a significant part of it was also dedicated to thesis to research. So, but it was by coursework actually. I went to other countries as my mobility path. So I was an exchange of students in Norway and also in the Czech Republic. Okay. Because my master's was an Erasmus funded master's. So I had to be in other countries for my second and my third semester. And it was just the personal desire to further my education.

Because besides doing research, beyond that, I started thinking that I, perhaps I have a place in academia because I was so interested. I got so interested in doing that. And I said, okay, then I need a master's degree. And for me to do a master's degree, let me try and apply for funding because I didn't have all the financial resources to fund a master's, especially abroad. Sure. So I got a fully funded scholarship and that was how I found myself in Germany studying for a master's. I already finished my master's and now I am just, yeah, looking for the next transition. And I understand the master's was in migration and intercultural relations,

which is an interesting parallel as you yourself are living in different countries and experiencing, perhaps a kind of like a migration experience. Exactly. So one beautiful thing about that master's program is that you leave the master's you're studying as a reality. So you study migration and intercultural relation, but you are a migrant constantly migrating, traveling from one country to the other in Europe. So it was very fulfilling. But honestly, at some point, kind of overwhelming because a lot of relocation, a lot of adaptations and all of that. It also, it was a good opportunity for me to further understand the experience I had. It was a good opportunity for me to understand how that experiences felt

within a different group, the migrant community. So it was very important. It was when I started doing that master's that I went fully into researching with migrants. Yeah. So since then, I've been trying to do research to understand how migration can affect the psychological well-being of migrants. And I tell you honestly, I think it's doing that research has been even more fulfilling than every other thing. Yeah. And is that sort of the focus of your PhD, hopefully? I mean, it could change and evolve over time, but in terms of psychological well-being of migrants. Is that something that will translate back to the Nigerian context, where are you hoping to take it? Yeah, to the Nigerian context, but in diaspora. So not really

going back to study Nigerians in Nigeria, except at some point in my PhD, my field work requires that I go to Nigeria, then of course I wouldn't mind. But of course, that has been the focus. It's already the focus for my master thesis because my thesis was also about migration and mental health and I did not need to take for that decision because my mind was already made up even before starting the master's that I want to focus on migration and mental health and yeah so to answer your question that is the focus of my PhD and I hope that for no reason it doesn't change hopefully to remain the same. Yeah.

How are you finding living in Germany being displaced from your people, I guess, your community, have you found new community, new purpose, new belonging? Okay. That's interesting because every day I remind myself that I am interested in doing migration and mental health research, but at the same time, I am a migrant. the living it with my own mental health so honestly it's not been so easy being displaced from my Nigerian social network and support system because of course it's well documented that such displacement has severe implications on the mental health of migrant and in Germany it's a bit

difficult to build a community that could provide social support especially when you don't have enough German skills to penetrate the system because when you cannot speak good German, then it's difficult to make friends in the fourth place. And even if you're going to make friends, sometimes you realize that you're just making migrant friends, your fellow migrant. And sometimes, you know, as much as the experience, you guys could also share some support and every other thing. but it's also interesting to get to know other people, right? But this is also very individualistic because the way I'm experiencing it might be completely different from the way someone else experiences it.

But for me, it's not been that easy to build social network. I have a few, a few friends, for example, and sometimes we do some gates together. I also have a Nigerian community here, which is great. And sometimes we share information, we share feelings and we share food as well, which is very cultural. Yeah, but apart from that, it's not been so easy because sometimes I miss my family, I miss my friends back home. I miss the weather. I miss the food. I miss the way we did things back in Nigeria.

But of course, I cannot be in Germany and there. expect Germany to be like Nigeria. So the only thing I can do about it is just try to adapt as much as possible. And then I continue to also keep in touch with my Nigerian social network virtually. So that's it. Yeah. I think the experience of trying to create new community in a different country is different if the people that you're mingling with, engaging with are there longer term or shorter term.

going to be a very different mindset of, I know I'm only going to spend two years with you and then you're going to move on kind of thing. So that must be different, depending on different communities. Are a lot of the people in your local Nigerian community there for a long time? Are they looking to just come for a short period and then move back? Yeah, exactly. It completely depends on your reality. Sometimes it depends on your legal status. Depends on the kind of you have. because just like you've pointed out, someone living in Germany for just six months or one year might not really put in so much effort into building a community or trying to learn the language, for example, because they know that they are going to live the country very soon.

So sometimes you find people like that who move here. For example, someone traveling from Nigeria to Germany as a tourist does not necessarily have a need to build. social network or to learn the language. And even for a lot of migrants, some of them already make up their mind that they are going to leave. So they just continue to count down to the time they are supposed to departs instead of trying to build a community or try to do other things that might promote a sense of belonging. So yeah, that's absolute. Yeah. I'm just reflecting on my mother's experience growing up in a military family and they had to move within Germany still, but every two years they were based in a different city. And so you really can't hold on to anything,

whether it's physical things or whether it's relationships. It makes that really difficult in terms of the belonging, as you said, but also identity. Yeah. And not just that, not just even the belonging because you know sometimes when we talk about belongingness people think it's just your ability to feel at home in that home country so that is true but why that is true it goes beyond that because it is also about the ability of that country to make you feel at home so sometimes even if you're making conscious efforts to feel at home in the country but the country is not making you feel at home then it might not work in the long run And in addition to that, staying long term or short term in a country and knowing fully well that you're going to stay for short time or long time makes a lot of difference.

For instance, if I know that I'm staying here for just one year or maybe one year and a half, there are things that I would like to do for myself if I were staying for five years that I cannot do right now because it would be wasteful to do. And when you're limiting yourself from the things that should give you maximum joy, then the sense of belonging also suffers. Say, for instance, I am here and there are some gadgets that I would want to buy. There are some structures I would want to buy. There are some kind of apartments. I would want to live in. All these things contribute to positive mental health status. But when you think about it, what is the need of buying this thing when I know that I will soon live the country?

So when you deny yourself of that, you also deny yourself of the happiness that comes from that, which could promote positive mental health and contribute to a long-time sense of belonging. Yeah. So, yeah, it makes a lot of difference. Yeah. So for you, the next steps, you're looking for someone to accept your PhD proposal. How do you even go about that? You're in a completely foreign country.

Walk me through the steps because it just sounds so comfortable. completely daunting to me. Yeah. I think daunting is the right word. Because it's not easy at all, especially at a PhD level. And I think one of the greatest challenges of doing a PhD is that requirement to find a supervisor before you can even submit an application. Because sometimes when I think about it, that process alone is highly subjective.

So it's going to completely depend on the potential supervisors acceptance of you. And maybe for you to take their acceptance boss, it depends on a lot of criteria which you are not aware of. It could depend on a lot of things. I don't want to make assumptions, but I know that it's going to depend on a whole lot of things. So to secure a supervisor is sometimes more tedious than the whole application process. And when you finally secure one, then you can paint a picture of a situation that you have a supervisor and now you apply for the program, but your application is not successful. So everything goes down the drain and you have to start with another person or wait for the next cycle. And I think the most difficult situation is when you don't even have enough time to wait for several cycles of application.

When you are limited by time, you think about it so much. So it's not been easy trying to navigate that process, especially with a lot of programs, a lot of social work programs being delivered in German here. So it would be difficult for me to enroll in such a program because I don't have adequate skills to undertake a PhD study in German. And then the ones delivered in English are limited and most of them are masters. So sometimes you just consider looking out of the box, looking out of the country to other English-speaking countries. Australia, for example, and the process is also not that easy.

And yeah, trying to navigate different universities, websites, trying to. trying to identify supervisors and trying to compile everything you need. I think at some point it's really overwhelming. Yeah. It's really overwhelming. But it's what it takes to be a student, to be a research student, so you have to do it. And how do you manage to stay in the country? What kind of visa and what protection does that afford you in terms of reassurance that you can get through this process?

It affords limited assurance. Yeah, because it's limited. The job seeker visa. That's the one I have currently, the German job seeker visa. So when you finish your master's in Germany, you get a visa that is valid for 18 months for one year and a half to search for a job. So before the expiration of the 18 months, you are supposed to find the next thing, find a job or find any other thing. could keep you in the country so you can transit from the job seeker visa to another visa so if you're looking for a job you're looking for a phd if you're looking for anything of your interest you have

to do it within one and a half years so for instance if you are getting close to the expiration but you've not gotten anything then there is pressure and for some people their mental health suffers sure so that's So whatever I am doing, I have to do it within 18 months. So that's why I said it doesn't have enough time. So when you're applying for anything, you're not just applying, you know, with the mindset that if it doesn't work out, I continue to work hard till it works out. Right. So at this point, determination might not be enough.

So being so strategic is also another thing. Yeah. And you know how applications work, especially for PhDs. It's in yearly cycles. So if you don't start a program in October, D.C. It has to be October the next year. And by October the next year, your visa already expired. So it's not easy trying to navigate all these things.

Yeah. So the clock is ticking well and truly. But do you get a second shot at it? Or you kind of just get one opportunity and then if you don't manage in the 18 months, that's it. Yeah. You don't get an extension for this view. or you can't do any other thing, because that visa is not issued twice or it's not extended.

Right. So you just have to get something. You have to get a job or get something or, you know, if you are infected in a PhD, you can do it. And you just have to sort it out yourself. That's the situation. And then you would ideally transition to a student visa. Is that the situation?

Yeah, if you decide to do a PhD, then it changes to student visa and then you can stay for the duration of the PhD and then you transit back to that job seeker visa again until you find something or if not you have to leave and yeah that's just it so student visa work visa just anything that would give you the legal status okay i imagine it can't just be any job that you get it would have to be someone sponsoring you to then qualify for some other visa. Is that right? Yeah. So it's going to depend on. So if you get a job, then you're staying in the country. It's tied to that job. It is the job. It is the employer that provides you the document that gives you access to a work

visa. Yeah. So if your contract is terminated, for example, then your stay also suffers. So these are the things that migrants always have to navigate, you know, a lot of people, not just job insecurity sometimes, but also document insecurity and, you know, this kind of thing. But of course, that's also the thing we discuss as researchers and the other things we try to gain more insight into how people navigate all these things. And that is why I'm so interested in how do they navigate all these things and still maintain maintain a positive mental health. Or if they do not maintain positive mental health, what is their mental health status? So yeah. How do you get through this? What sort of support do

you need? You mentioned your network and your community around you, but for any social work, the topic of self-care is a big thing. How is this sustainable for you? Well, I think that in situations like this, individual characteristics come to play a lot. So beyond the social network you have, either the one you maintain visually or the one you keep here physically, your personal traits as a human being also matters a lot. That is when now we talk about resilience and other features. So for some people, the whole situation, they are still able to over. come, they are still able to push through despite limited social network and support systems. So I feel this is my case because it doesn't really affect me that bad.

Because for some people, it weighs down on them a lot and they are not able to do things. A lot of migrants always talk about seasonal depression, for example. But I'm just fortunate that I never found myself in that circle. So even with the limited social network and with the one I maintain from my country, like talking with my friends and family on the phone and meeting with my Nigerian community here, but once in a blue moon, I'm still able to navigate all these things and still, yeah, remain psychologically cool. That's really good to hear. Zero millions plays a lot of role here. Yeah. Sure.

Yeah. Do I remember reading that you were also volunteering? I don't know if that was in Nigeria or in Germany. What's that about? Oh yeah. I was doing that in Nigeria. Okay. All right.

Yes. What kind of volunteering and what was the aim of that? It was with a non-governmental organization. So that organization is focused on providing support, you know, providing educational support, providing financial support, and also providing psychosocial support to the most vulnerable people in Nigeria, especially young people. So it's the kind of support it provides is in terms of outreaches to different communities, you know, to different schools to provide psychosocial support to school children and to

student and also provide them with some educational materials in a modest capacity. So that's why just like the name implies the name of the organization is a little drop that counts. I still volunteer with this organization, but since I left Nigeria, I've not been able to participate in physical outreaches. What we contribute online to the designing of outreaches and you know, trying to to brainstorm on what to do and how to do, how to do it and then provide support to those our members back in Nigeria who then do the physical process. Yeah. That's a really great way of staying connected and I'm sure they're very happy to continue to have your input in that program. Exactly. I think they do. And I'm also really happy

because when we discuss things and then we go on outreaches and they share pictures on our platform and I look at it, it gives me that sense of having a family. You know, people, who you do things which you plan things, you do things and you execute it and we are happy to achieve our goals together. So yeah, it helps a lot. Yeah, nice. If you were to do some sort of practical social work, whether it's an NGO or a government agency, what would you be really passionate about? Would it be working in mental health or would it be working with young people? What are you passionate about? I wouldn't even think twice to tell you that it's clear. practical practice. This is what I want to do. It's what I want to do. Yeah. I'm so interested in the mental

well-being, understanding how people navigate mental health, their challenges, risk factors, and a whole lot of other situations that people do not think about, which could be dangerous to mental health. So clinical practice would be my first choice. Would you like to teach as well? You know, sometimes it's, I feel things happen not just the way we plan them, but also the way that we imagine them. Yeah. So I am not saying that you imagine things and then you don't walk towards them and it happened. But when you imagine things, that imagination is going to push you to start walking towards them if actually you want to do. that. Sure. Yeah. So apart from that practice, that's why I told you from the beginning that I feel like I have a place in academia. It's also one thing I want to do, but I know for sure, no doubt,

that whether I am practicing social work or I am teaching or providing some sort of guidance to students, it's always about mental health. Always. So if it's in school or or in practice, it's also mental health. Because I feel like when we do something you have the drive to do, that's what gets you going when there might be tough situations. Yeah. Not many social workers who are very early in their career, such as you have published at this stage.

Can you tell me a little bit about some of those publications and maybe one that you're really proud of? Okay. To answer that question, I should give credit to my mentors because it was that early exposure while I was studying for my bachelor that made it possible. So then I had lecturers who would include me in some data collection. That was how it started. They would take me to the field.

So what I was doing basically was just to take some field notes or to just record interview. that was how he started and at some point I started learning more they started teaching me how to do research going deeper into methodologies you know and it was handsome because they were giving me tasks to do they were you know giving me things to do to write or to read something or just to read and give them and summarize that was how they did it and from doing that you know I started doing research and I've also been a member of a research team and I always give credit to DBI DBIA Kukuo, Social Solutions Research Group. I really appreciate my membership of that research group

because it's helped me a lot. I've also learned a lot in that research group. So we do research, collaborate on projects, both individual and the general projects that we do. And yeah, That's how the publications came about. And also I have my own personal research that I do, even apart from the research group. But if I want to do research, for example, and I want to include my colleagues from the research group, I do that.

Otherwise, I collaborate with other people to do my own personal research. Yeah. Yeah. You know, in your free time, you've got so much going on. Yeah. So basically the publications, they are a result of mentorship, basically. Yeah. I would say early mentorship, that's what happened.

Sure. But that speaks to your networking and your ability to build this, not just a friendship community around you, but a professional community. So the more people that you collaborate with, hopefully the better chances of fulfilling your goal of going into academia and staying there and making a difference will be. That's kind of how it works. Yeah, hopefully.

hopefully. Yeah. I would love to check back in with you in three, six months time and see where you've gotten to it. And hopefully by that stage, well before that stage, you've got answers and you have direction and you have security at least. But is there anything for now that you feel like we haven't had an opportunity to talk about anything you wished I'd asked? Well, I think we exhausted everything, even though discussions like this are not exhaustive. because as you talk, other ideas continue to come and then we continue to dive into other things. But I think for now we've touched everything, except for one thing I would just like to say. Well, I don't know whether this is the right platform to do that, but I would just kind of leave a word of encouragement for other people like me because I know that thousands and millions of people out there,

especially social work students or early career researchers like me. Yeah, so I just want to tell them that everything that is good never comes easy. So it's always difficult at some point. But the most important thing they should understand is that it is so, so crucial that anything you're doing and you know that you find fulfillment in doing this, just hold on to it. So you have to continue doing it, no matter what happens. Because when I started doing research, it's not because I sat down one day and I thought,

oh, I want to do this and then I must do it. So at some point when the professors or my mentors started taking me to the field, it didn't really make a whole lot of sense to me because I just said, okay, let me do what I am asked to do. but then sometimes you just discover that in your confusion, that is where you find yourself. So whatever you are doing, if you feel like it is something worth doing, then you have to do it really well. Because tomorrow you don't know where it takes you and then your confusion today might just be yourself discovering the near future. So yeah, that's just it.

Yeah, that's really beautiful. And I think that also speaks to there can be such an isolation with academia. You can feel like you're just working in isolation and you're heading toward a path and you don't have a lot of feedback necessarily from your peers to say this is a good direction or this is something that's worthwhile. You just have to rely on your gut instinct or maybe your supervisors saying, yep, this is the right way. this is working towards something that's good. So it can feel as though you're beating your head against a wall sometimes

and feel really disheartening at other times. Exactly. Especially when you have to face the rejections that are popular in academia. My friends and I will call it love letters. I mean, for example, when you apply for scholarships or when you submit your paper to a journal and it gets rejected, immediately. Things like that could make you feel like what you just said, hitting your head against a wall, but it's part of the process for sure. Yeah. Do you have much contact with the

other students that you went through with the bachelor degree? Then do you know what they're doing? Are they having similar struggles? Oh, yeah. I have contact with many of them, of course. So some of them, a good number of them are also, they also migrated to different countries. And then they also studied for a master. Some of them are still studying. Others already finished and doing their PhDs. So yeah, many of them are in similar situations. I have many of them in Australia, in the US and other countries in.

Europe and I keep in touch with them and we really share similar experiences. That kind of makes me wonder if there are familial expectations or barriers then to getting into the social work profession. If so many people as you say who study social work then go on to leave the country, yeah, I feel like if I were to say to my parents, I'm going to study social work and there's an expectation that that means you're going to leave the country, there'd be less support potentially. understand i completely understand yeah but the thing is that the migration that happens the immigration from Nigeria is not peculiar to social work graduates or social work practitioners but the thing is that

emigration from Nigeria has become very popular in recent times among a lot of people a lot of young people so not necessarily you know people who studied social work but you know that Despite the course you studied, education is a good route to leave the country. So less stressful, it's less demanding when you want to follow that educational route to migrate. So this is why a lot of educated people always migrate because it's easiest for them, especially with scholarships. But yeah, it also raises the concern you're talking about like when we think of brain drain. So if all social work graduates live the country who practice,

to see social work then. Yeah, but the good thing is a lot of people also return when they travel abroad and they gain further knowledge like doing a master's or PhD. Many of them also return to Nigeria to practice or to teach in school or to work in major social work organization. So I think it's not really that bad. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, thank you again for your time.

It's been so lovely speaking with you. and you've helped me to understand, I mean, I guess social work is a young profession in Nigeria. There's issues ongoing in terms of recognition and licensing, but as you said, social workers are hopefully more and continuing to occupy spaces where we can do a lot of good. And your research interests specifically in terms of the psychological well-being of the migration experience is wonderful. You're having these challenges that you've been so open in talking about in terms of having your research topic accepted and just the migration experience yourself and being able to tackle all the visa expectations and requirements that go with that, being displaced

and finding community and belonging. But there's real potential, I think, for social workers to stake a claim in these areas that are more traditionally held by other professionals. being able to stand up and say, I'm a social worker and I can help in this way because of my training and because of my values and experience. So I think our profession really needs people like yourself who are passionate and driven like you are. I think you're a great role model and hopefully that's a real encouragement for others to be able to follow in your footsteps or at the very least just be able to identify what it is that they want to do and be able to go for that goal. So thank you so much for being passionate and being so good at communicating.

And hopefully we'll see a lot more of that in the future. Yeah, thank you so much. So once again, I really appreciate the opportunity to be on the podcast to discuss, you know, share collegial experiences and then talk about potentials and also challenges. So it also gives that sense of understanding that the social work profession is really open. And then you continue to collaborate across borders, you know, thank God for digital space. And then we, we discuss like these. And then, yeah, it's really fulfilling.

Thanks for joining me this week. If you would like to continue this discussion or ask anything of either myself or a manual, please visit my anchor page at anchor.fm. slash social work spotlight. You can find me on Facebook, Instagram and Blue Sky. Or you can email SW Spotlight. podcast at gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you. Next episode's guest is Susanna, with over 15 years working in frontline social care

as a social worker in children's and adult services, and now as a registered manager at an outstanding rated independent fostering agency in England. Susanna is also the creator of My Tapie Place, a well-being platform designed specifically for frontline professionals. I release a new episode every two weeks. Please subscribe to my podcast so you're notified when this next episode is available. See you then.