With just a 3% acceptance rate, the Rhodes Scholarship at the University of Oxford is one of the most prestigious graduate programs in the world. One of this year’s winners is from right here in Alexandria.
Rhodes Scholar Hadi Kamara hopes his story shows people it’s never too late to achieve your dreams.
“I actually ended up leaving high school with a 2.08 GPA, right? That’s not the first thing that people think of when they hear ‘Rhodes scholar,’ right?” Kamara said.
But he is here to prove everyone wrong.
Raised in Alexandria by a single mom who emigrated from Sierra Leone, Kamara enlisted in the U.S. Air Force out of high school in 2019 and became a flying crew chief, in charge of making sure the airplanes were safe.
“You can’t be someone who lacks discipline. You can’t be undisciplined because it doesn’t just affect you, right?” he said. “A lack of performance or a lack of ability to adhere to standards puts other people in danger. And so when you’re in a situation like that, even as a teenager, it forces you to grow up a little faster.”
During his time in the military, Kamara spent his weekends taking online classes at Northern Virginia Community College, also known as Nova. That’s where, he says, he grew to love learning.
“You know, it was Nova for me that really laid that foundation that allowed me to catapult myself to the Ivy League,” Kamara said.
He transferred to Princeton University, where he’s now finishing up his senior year as a politics major. In addition to being a mentor in the student veterans group and the transfer students association, he also interned at the Pentagon this past summer, doing NATO policy work. In addition, he’s studied abroad in Kenya, Australia and England.
“It wasn’t until I joined the military that I recognized just how interconnected the world really is,” Kamara said. “I’ve just been forced to engage with different facets of the world, different academic styles, different modes of thinking and viewing the world.”
Most recently, Kamara went through the tough application process to become a Rhodes scholar. The University of Oxford only picks 32 from the United States each year.
Kamara found out earlier this month he got in — but his mom never had any doubt.
“I find out I win; I immediately make the move to call my mom, like, ‘Mom, I won! I’m a Rhodes scholar!’ She’s like, ‘Yeah, I told you you’d be.”
Kamara plans to pursue a master of philosophy in international relations at Oxford. After that, he hopes to attend law school and get into policy or public service work.
He says he urges his fellow veterans to make use of programs that help servicemembers attend college.
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