Three times she was denied a university place. Today she is a lecturer at Mzuzu University. Her name is Lydia Banda Tembo.
For many, failure feels final, a closed door and a quiet verdict that perhaps one was not meant for something greater. For Tembo, failure was the beginning of a different journey: one that tested her patience, stretched her resilience and ultimately redefined her destiny.
After completing her Malawi School Certificate of Education (MSCE), Tembo was full of the optimism that follows hard work and decent results. Like thousands of young Malawians, she sat the University Entrance Examinations (UEE) and waited for her name to appear on the list of successful candidates. When it did not, the disappointment was sharp but not decisive.
She tried again. And again. Each attempt brought more determination and, when the results came back the same, deeper doubt. After three unsuccessful tries, the silence that followed felt heavier. Days became weeks, weeks became months. While friends moved on to campus life, Tembo found herself stalled. Eventually the system closed the door on further UEE attempts; it felt final.
Instead of letting rejection define her, Tembo chose to redefine her path. She enrolled at the Malawi College of Health Sciences for a Diploma in Nursing and a Certificate in Midwifery. Nursing was not her original plan, but the door opened and she walked through it with renewed purpose.
At Dowa District Hospital, where she began working in 2011, the long shifts and quiet moments between life and loss shaped her character. Yet the small, persistent voice inside her urged: you can go further.
Between 2013 and 2014 Tembo re-entered higher education through a mature‑entry programme at Kamuzu University of Health Sciences, pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Paediatric Nursing. She was no longer the same person who had first sat the UEE: she was stronger, wiser and more focused. She graduated with a credit — a milestone that felt like redemption and proof that earlier rejections had not reflected her ability.
After returning to Dowa to continue serving, Tembo’s career took another turn. In 2016 she joined Holy Family College of Nursing and Health Sciences as a tutor. Standing before students, guiding and shaping future nurses, she experienced a quiet, full‑circle moment: the girl once rejected by universities was now teaching those on the path she had once struggled to enter.
Tembo did not stop there. In 2019 she enrolled for a Master of Science in Child Health Nursing, balancing study with work and family responsibilities. Her perseverance paid off. In 2025 she was appointed lecturer in the Department of Nursing and Midwifery at Mzuzu University, the very kind of institution that had once turned her away.
Today Lydia Banda Tembo is more than a lecturer; she is a symbol of perseverance. Her journey reminds us that success is rarely a straight line. Detours, delays and setbacks can shape us, prepare us and position us for opportunities we could not have foreseen.
Her message to those still waiting is simple and clear: keep going, work hard and trust the process. One day you may find yourself standing where you once prayed to be not as an applicant, but as someone who has already made it.
