Graduate from Nigeria says she found a second family in Liberty’s public health program

In deciding to pursue her Master of Public Health (MPH) residentially at Liberty University, Olufunmilayo Babarinde (’21) temporarily left much of her life, including her husband and young daughter, behind in her home country of Nigeria in order to answer a calling on her life from God. Now having walked the Commencement stage on Tuesday, Babarinde sees her Liberty experience as reassurance that God has set before her a path to serving populations in her community and possibly around the world.

After earning her undergraduate degree in Environmental Management and Toxicology in Nigeria, Babarinde wanted to pursue graduate-level education and a career in some form of public health, but she had a desire to study abroad. Her younger sister, Opeyemi, who is also residing in the United States, told her about Liberty’s MPH program and its option for a concentration in global health.

“I had been involved in a part of public health before and I wanted to pursue environmental health sciences, but I wanted to have an education abroad since it’d been on my mind for a number of years,” Babarinde said. “If not for (my sister) bringing up Liberty University I would not have researched it or known that there was this beautiful program in public health they have here.”

Babarinde had never traveled outside of Nigeria before and she and her husband, Oluwaseun, had a daughter Toluwanimi who was 2 years old at the time, making the choice to leave for Lynchburg, Va., significantly harder.

“That was the toughest decision I’ve ever made in my life, leaving Nigeria in the time that I left it,” she said. “Everything made sense for me to just stay in Nigeria except that I felt the Lord was telling me I had to go. I remember telling God that my desire was to be with my family and take care of my family. I was finding my purpose and fulfillment in that, but the Lord kept taking me to the Scripture (Matthew 10:39) that says, ‘If you cling to your life you will lose it; but if you give it up for me, you will find it.’”

Her passion for the global health profession is rooted in its ability to reach populations and countries that may often be overlooked or even neglected, allowing her to be a part of bringing aid to those who need it most.

“Global health is all encompassing, it considers improving the health of wherever you are or where you see needs care; it helps you look beyond, and I find that very relevant especially today with the pandemic where you see the international movement impact the health of nations,” Babarinde said.

In the Fall 2019 semester, Babarinde arrived at Liberty with questions about what lay ahead for her family and fears about her time in the classroom, but she soon saw God calm those fears. She has been able to talk to her husband and daughter on a regular basis through WhatsApp, and she noted that her husband has “been more than 100 percent supportive in me being here and following God.”

“I had a lot of anxieties about who’s going to look after my home and my daughter, how I was going to be in a (new) country, and how I was going to cope with the teachers and understand what they were teaching me,” she said. “But it didn’t take long for me to be reassured that I was where God wanted me to be because all of my fears were swallowed when I saw God was taking care of my family, and I didn’t have a single communication challenge with my professors and classmates.”

Throughout her time on campus, Babarinde said that her professors did more than just teach her about the course subjects, they took the time to help her engage academically and became like a second family to her when she was unable to visit her family as planned over the summer in 2020 due to COVID-19 travel restrictions.

“I feel like I ask questions more than most people, and so if you’re not patient you could discard them, but the professors were so patient and went the extra mile to answer me and help me understand,” Babarinde said. “During the COVID pandemic I was supposed to go home but I couldn’t, and it was such a difficult time when I could have gone through mental health issues, but my professors would come to me and ask how I was doing and helped to keep me sane.”

“I have my family back in Nigeria but I also have a family in the Department of Public & Community Health, and I’ve seen them do that for other students as well,” she added.

Babarinde felt even further from home just a few months later with the passing of her father in September 2020, her only contact with him during his last days being through her cell phone. In the midst of this time when she considered pulling out of the program and going back to Nigeria, her professors again proved that they were invested in her as more than just a student.

“When he passed, I had a lot of classes and I felt I had to tell my professors and (department chair) Dr. (Oswald) Attin, who is like a big brother to me, and all of these people rose up for me in prayer and encouragement,” she said. “I didn’t ask them for anything but they went out of their way to provide for me in many ways, and for that I am very grateful. I found the strength to finish my classes and my exams, and it was a time when I was reminded that when God tells you to do something you need to do it, and He can provide for you.”

With her degree now in-hand, Babarinde will be pursuing her doctorate in environmental health sciences at a different university in the United States and plans to visit her loved ones in Nigeria in December.

During Tuesday’s degree presentation ceremony for the School of Health Sciences, Babarinde was named the Master of Public Health Student of the Year.