“It has helped make my university experience much better and helped me profoundly in my education."

For Medical student Anushka Shukla, a President’s Scholarship is helping with the costs of living in London and allowing her to embrace extracurricular activities.

I have really enjoyed the vast amount of opportunities we get at Imperial, not only in our education, there are so many social opportunities. This year, I danced in the East Meets West show as part of the Indian Society as well as joining sports teams such as Hockey. Imperial is such a diverse place where everyone can find something that suits them.

As part of my medical degree, I get the opportunity to go on GP placements every fortnight. This has been so interesting as not only have we been able to gain experience and insight into what it is like to be a GP, we also got to talk to several patients about their experience in healthcare. This has been so interesting to learn from a different perspective but also has taught us a lot about communication skills. The School of Medicine is amazing for offering us early patient contact.

I am part of the leadership team for a charity outside of university. We raise money to buy and distribute HPV vaccinations to schoolgirls in India due to the rising cases of cervical cancer and the lack of vaccines in India. As part of the charity, I have organised two charity balls and visited an orphanage in India every year, this summer we hope to distribute the vaccines. During my medical career, I would love to continue doing this and help to tackle this international problem.

When coming to London, I was very nervous about the financial aspects of studying for six years. However, the scholarship has helped relieve the stress and solely focus on my education and extracurricular activities. Not worrying about having to get a job during the school term has been a massive help. As well as that, I have used the money to buy extra resources for my course such as Netters Flashcards for physiology and anatomy.

I just want to say a massive thank you to everyone that has donated. It has helped make my university experience much better and helped me profoundly in my education. I feel very lucky to be attending Imperial and to be a President’s Scholar.