By Raqib Hameed Naik, TwoCircles.net
Srinagar: Eighteen-year-old Adeeba Tak from Shopian district in south Kashmir has brought laurels to the valley by securing admission in the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) USA to pursue Mechanical Engineering. She has been offered 100% scholarship to pursue the course.
“I always wanted to be an aeronautical engineer. Looking at the planes in the sky always gave me goosebumps. I was always excited about learning the engineering behind this,” Adeeba told TwoCircles.net.
“Getting into UPenn is a dream come true. My faculties at RiSE, especially Mubeen Sir and Salman Sir always guided me for the same. Their strategies regarding tackling any exams or interviews have been very helpful. I want everyone from Kashmir especially my hometown Shopian to always dream big,” she said.
UPenn is one of the most prestigious universities in the world. It boasts of producing 30 Nobel laureates, 25 billionaires – the most by any University at the undergraduate level, and a significant number of Fortune 500 CEOs.
Adeeba was hand-picked by RiSE team in 2015 when she topped the first edition of RiSE talent search examination, RiSE is a Valley-based mentoring centre for competitive exams started by three IITians from three different parts of India including one from Kashmir.
“It is a moment of pride for us. We, along with Adeeba, feel extremely jubilant and content because our efforts of past two years have been rewarded,” Mubeen Masudi, an IIT Bombay alumnus and the co-founder of RiSE, told TwoCircles.net.
“This achievement is significant for her. UPenn will be an ideal launch pad for her successful career ahead. It will do justice to her unrelenting desire to learn and grow. This result is also significant for us and our students. I see more and more students talking about this. I see parents of young girls inquiring about the admission process. This result has transformed another impossible dream into an achievable goal. I am confident we will see many more like Adeeba in the years to come. The hope has been ignited,” he added.
Salman Shahid, an IIT Kharagpur alumnus and faculty at RiSE sees a lot of potential in the Kashmiri youth and if identified and shown the right path, they can get admissions in best universities across the world. “Results like that of Adeeba and Moin are a step in the direction of transforming the education sector in Kashmir. They will inspire many more successes in the future. Our team braves the shutdown, curfews, strikes, but impact like this makes everything worthwhile,” he told TwoCircles.net.
RiSE was set up in 2012 by a IITians to coach and empower talented Kashmiri students to get into prestigious educational institutions.