April 23, 2019

Hard work, perseverance helps couple to achieve their dreams

Dr Robert and Queen Ogie juggle study, work, and parenthood. 

The past few years have been an immense juggle for Queen Ogie.

The University of Wollongong (UOW) graduate, who received her Bachelor of Nursing on Tuesday (23 April), has been navigating the demands of motherhood, work, and studying full time. To make matters even more complex, she has been doing it alongside her husband, Dr Robert Ogie, who in November graduated from UOW with a Doctor of Philosophy, which he also completed while working full time.

But the young couple, who have four children under the age of seven, are remarkably relaxed about how hard the past few years have been, attempting to make space in their lives for all their competing demands.

Queen said their love for their respective roles and their passion for their professions has helped them to put one foot in front of the other.

“Nursing is something I’ve always wanted to do,” Queen said.

“Being passionate about our studies and our work has made it much easier to get it all done,” said Robert, who gained his PhD in disaster informatics with a focus on floods.

Queen began her degree in nursing three years ago, with a two-week-old baby in tow. Her sister, who is also a mother of two and a nursing student at UOW, helped with babysitting at times– they would sit down at the start of the semester and attempt to map out their classes and tutorials so someone would always be available to look after the kids. When her sister was not available, Queen would take her newborn along to classes.

“It was hard,” Queen said. “But we were looking at the future and knew we had to just keep pushing through.”

A born nurse, she is passionate about helping people in their times of need and said looking after others comes naturally to her.

Queen has been working as an Assistant in Nursing, providing care and support for people living with a disability. She said she feels drawn to the profession.

“I love to help and support people, particularly the elderly and individuals with a special need, and know that I am a friendly face at a difficult time in their lives.”

While she is enjoying maternity leave at the moment – the couple’s youngest is a gorgeous, smiley four-month-old boy – Queen is looking forward to putting her degree to use when she returns to the workforce. She even dreams of furthering her education in a few years with a Master of Nursing.

Robert, for his part, is an Associate Research Fellow (Critical Infrastructure & Disaster Modelling) at UOW’s SMART Infrastructure Facility. His PhD research explored how graph theory can be used for improving decision making relating to flood management in coastal mega-cities of developing nations.

With an undergraduate degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from the Nnamdi Azikiwe University in Nigeria, and a Master of Information Systems from the University of New England in Australia, Robert’s research has kept him busy over the past few years.

But now that they have both completed their studies – for now – Queen and Robert are looking forward to a bit of down time as a family.

Date night, they laughed, is no longer a distant memory. They are now finding more special moments to enjoy together without the impending deadline of an assignment or an academic task. But they said the most essential component to getting through the juggle of the past few years has been their mutual encouragement and love. And since they were both traversing the tightrope of study, work, and parenting, they knew exactly what each other was going through.

“We are very supportive of each other,” Robert said. “We try to help each other as much as we can. That has been important to both of us.”

Queen Ogie and Dr Robert Ogie and their children.