News & Features, October 2017

Some grads don’t have to go far for a job

When some students graduate from Saint Augustine’s University, they don’t have to look far for a job. In fact, they never leave.

Nenfort Golit is a good example. He was a computer science major as a student and, during his four years here, spent time helping out Carlene Morgan in the Academic Computing Department.

“I had already started working for her so they recommend me when there was a job opening on campus,” Golit explained. He graduated in 2017 and now works as a computer lab assistant for Saint Augustine’s.

While it may not seem very adventurous to remain on campus for your first job after graduation, on the other hand Golit is thrilled to be working in a place where he was a student only a short while ago.

“I love my job and I love working for the university,” he said. “I love that they are able to use me for my computer knowledge and my love for technology.”

Working is different from being a student, Golit said. He is learning things that he did not have to know as a student – for example how to troubleshoot computers and install and update software.

Golit may not gone far after graduation, but he is not afraid to travel far from home. He came to Saint Augustine’s from Plateau, Nigeria. He know he had to go overseas for an education and applied to several colleges in the United States, including Shaw University, where his uncle was an alumni, as well as Harvard and North Carolina A&T. But he was rejected from some, and missed deadlines for others.

“The competition was high and there so many tests,” Golit recalled. “I always passed but still didn’t get in due to students scoring higher than me.”

Golit did not let the setbacks stop him. “I started traveling around the world to try to find out what I can be,” he explained. “Then one day I discovered my love for computer technology. That was when I went to South Korea and saw so much technology that I hadn’t seen before.”

Golit tried again to vet into college and ended up at Saint Augustine University, which he chose because he was familiar with the area through his uncle. He thrived on the “family environment and one-on-one personal attention,” he said, in. And although technology at Saint Augustine’s may not be as advanced as at some other institutions, it was more advanced than what Golit was used to back home.

He college activities included being involved in Honors College, and a member of the Pre Alumni Council and Active Minds.

His future goal is to go to graduate school – he plans to apply to Harvard or N.C. A&T and may end up at one of those institutions after all. Golit hopes to get his masters degree in computer science, concentrating in software engineering.

— Sterling Raynor