Empowering Students to Drive Change

"No words can express how grateful I feel for this support."

Vital in any year, gifts to scholarships were especially meaningful to INSEAD in 2020/2021, providing financial support to students even as the pandemic forced the school to make budget cuts and drove an increase in scholarship requests.

Scholarships have significant impact beyond opening doors to talented students. They affirm each individual’s potential and aspirations and equip students to make a difference in the world. One example is Koffi Koumi MBA’22J, who thought he wouldn’t be able to attend INSEAD for financial reasons.

“Most INSEADers use Prodigy or Brain Capital to fund their tuition,” explains Koumi, “yet, due to my Togolese citizenship, I was not eligible for Prodigy. Brain Capital also rejected my application because I have French citizenship. French banks refused to give me a loan because I did not have a French guarantor.”

Receiving the MBA’05J & MBA’05D Scholarship enabled Koumi to say “yes” to INSEAD. With his degree, he plans to create a consultancy that supports manufacturing companies in Africa and creates more manufacturing jobs for African citizens.

Luiza Lemos MBA’22J, a Brazilian, faced a similar situation. “Living in a country with economic and political instability made it challenging for me to fund an international MBA,” she says. “Without a scholarship, I would have had to rely fully on loans.”

Luiza intends to use her INSEAD degree to create a better life for farmers in her home country by launching an agro-marketplace that allows farmers to sell direct to consumers. “My Deepak and Sunita Gupta Scholarship has inspired me to help others and give back to the community,” she says.

Sakshi Arora MBA’22D, who was working as a consultant with start-ups and NGOs in healthcare and EdTech prior to INSEAD, has her own story of gratitude. She experienced many “lows” while searching for loans and began to regret having followed her passion to work in India’s development sector instead of building up her savings.

“I am truly indebted to the Brown Family for my INSEAD scholarship,” Sakshi says. “They came through for me when all hope seemed lost. No words can express how grateful I feel for this support, enabling me to fulfil my dream of attending INSEAD and one day running a successful global business.”