‘I was average, but will die a prominent scientist’

By Protus Onyango

When John Maina Kianja (pictured right) sat his KCPE exams in 2001 at St Elizabeth Academy, Karen, and scored 395 marks out of 500, he did not let this dampen his spirit of becoming a scientist.

He joined St Elizabeth Boys High School and capitalised on the closeness of his home to school to work hard.

"The school was next to our house, so I spent more time studying and could even wake up at 5am and be helped by teachers who were residing in school," Kianja says. "I knew I would realise my full potential if I concentrated on science subjects. I did Biology, Chemistry and Physics in form four and scored a mean grade of B- (minus) but performed well in the sciences."

In 2006, Kianja joined Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology to study Medical Microbiology.

"It was a huge shift from the general science we studied in high school. It opened a whole new world, as we got closer to inner mechanisms that make science," he says.

During his third year at the university, he got injured while playing and quit rugby, which he started playing in Class Seven.

Anti-Malaria project

"It was hard just to abandon a game I had loved so much, but the injury was a blessing in disguise. I now concentrated more on my classwork. During my final year, I did a project on how to ‘Isolate Anti-Malaria Compounds from Algae’. It really motivated me because malaria is a serious problem in Africa and I was happy contributing information towards its eradication," says Kianja.

He graduated with second-class honours and joined the University of Cape Town, in South Africa for his second degree in Molecular and Cell Biology.

"I now got involved in how to manipulate genomes and how to use cells in drug making. Moving from Jkuat to Cape Town was a huge shift in relation to technology. It was a steep learning curve. I later did my project on ‘HIV/Aids: Analysing the Affectivity of HIV on Human Cells’. This is an important study in preventing HIV from being infectious," Kianja says.

He again graduated with a second-class honours degree last year and his supervisors were very happy with his work that they arranged for funding of his further studies.

Kianja is now in a class of five students who have finished a degree course in structural biology. It is a joint programme between the Universities of Cape Town and Western Cape.

"The funding by both universities kept me focused on my studies and eased the pressure off my parent," he says.

Funding to students

He topped his class with a first class honours degree and is to enrol for his doctorate degree next year. "I hope to clear my PhD in 2014, enrol for my post-doctoral studies and come back home to help improve Kenya with my knowledge," he says.

However, the student is urging the Government to increase its funding to universities for research and development.

"In Kenya, universities focus so much on theory and not practicals. It is useless to have all the theories but have nowhere to apply them. Science is dynamic and needs daily updates," he cautions.

To the youth, he advises, "Success is not a one-day thing. It is not spending many hours on Facebook, Twitter or merrymaking. Keep learning. Advance your knowledge. Be different and the best in what you do. Spend your resources intelligently. Use what you have as the world will not give you what you want. Contact other students in universities across the world to exchange ideas."