She has defied all odds to not only graduate with Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Information Technology.
In the process, Meenal Prasad has also walked away with two gold medals and the best female undergraduate from the School of Information Technology and Engineering, a field usually dominated by men.
The 21-year-old said she had always been passionate about science and technology since she was a young girl.
She never saw gender as a hindrance to her academic journey and believes nothing is impossible for one who has passion for their career or education.
“There were only a few girls in my batch, so it was a bit hard in the beginning, but as we progressed and mingled there was no boys and girls, we were all just students,” she said.
Ms Prasad pointed to her parents as her main source of motivation. She was the recipient of Gold Medal and GEM IT Prize as the most outstanding graduate majoring in Computing Science, as well as the Gold Medal and Cost U Less Prize for the most outstanding Bachelor of Science graduate.
Ms Prasad dedicated her achievements to her family and thanked them for their support throughout her academic journey.
She now works as a graduate cyber security analyst at Vodafone Fiji and plans to pursue her postgraduate studies next year.
Ms Prasad was among 520 students who graduated from USP’s first graduation session yesterday.
