Prestigious Scholarships for First Generation Student

A final year student at the University of Lincoln, UK, has overcome major personal challenges to be awarded two prestigious scholarships, following his studies in MSc Pharmaceutical Science at the institution.

As the first member of his family to attend university, Aaron Dexter enrolled in MSc Pharmaceutical Science with a keen interest in molecular biology and pharmacology.

However, his academic path to success was not without trial; he faced numerous challenges during his A level studies, commenting, “Before joining the University of Lincoln, I received relatively poor A-levels, became estranged from my parents, and after a gap year, I decided to pursue a degree in pharmaceutical sciences. Despite not having an ideal introduction to academia, I have recently been offered two separate scholarships to study a PhD in Pharmacology at the University of Cambridge this October.

“I wouldn’t be in the position I am if it weren’t for the continuous support of the University of Lincoln’s professors and lecturers, who gave me the knowledge required to pursue this path and supplied me with opportunities to further develop my knowledge of past that of the base degree.”

The first scholarship Aaron was awarded was on behalf of the National Institute of Agricultural Botany (NIAB), an agricultural research company. Here, Aaron’s fully funded project would focus on creating newer, safer pesticides without any human or crop risk. His additional scholarship is the University of Cambridge Harding Distinguished Postgraduate Scholarship.

Speaking about his passion for his research area within the field of pharmaceutical science, he said: “The Harding Distinguished Postgraduate Scholarship provides support to academically outstanding PhD students and my project will aim to better understand the processes involved in inflammatory and hemostatic functions within the human body.

“This comes from an opportunity I was lucky enough to receive last summer, in which the University of Lincoln financially enabled me to spend a month-long collaboration in Austria at the Medical University of Innsbruck to learn various molecular biology techniques and opened my eyes to that side of biology.”