From Ghana to the cornfields of Indiana, senior Afia Asamoah has lived life to the fullest at Taylor University.
Asamoah is a biology major, following the investigations and applications track. After graduating, she plans on going to Ohio State University for her doctorate in molecular, cellular and developmental biology. She hopes to teach biology in college after finishing her studies.
“The reason I love biology so much is because it's a window into God's mind,” Asamoah said. “You can see how he made us and the complexity that is honestly sometimes overwhelming to think about.”
Her father used to work for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, and he had some friends who recommended Taylor to their family. This is how she and her brother, Kwame Asamoah, who graduated in 2023, came to the university.
Asamoah said because she and her brother were both interested in biology, they changed the saying “the world is your oyster” into “the world is your lab”.
Asamoah is currently a presidential fellow under Rev. Greg Dyson.
This role includes helping with coordinating chapel, planning school wide events and welcoming visitors and speakers who come to campus.
Asamoah said that something most people don’t know about her role is that, since she works in the chapel office, she is often there before chapel starts and sometimes gets to pray with the guest speaker.
“That's always neat to get to meet them before, and that's a really cool interaction that I get to do,” she said.
As an international student from Ghana, Asamoah has struggled with homesickness as well as having to figure out a whole new system of life. Balancing school, social life and work has been difficult, but she has felt very supported by her community at Taylor.
Her friends and people in her department and the office of intercultural programs have helped and supported her through her years at Taylor.
She said the Taylor faculty make all the difference because they truly care for their students, not only because it’s their job. She has felt loved, seen and cared for by them.
As Asamoah is on the edge of stepping into a new phase of her life, she is excited as well as scared. She fears the changes that will be coming her way, but she also knows that over time she will adapt.
“It's going to take time to adjust, and I won't be with these people who have been my rock for the past four years, but I've learned that I will find people wherever I go, that there's good people out there,” she said.
Asamoah loves writing and feels that this new phase of her life is a clean slate on which she can write her story with God as he leads her into what he wants her to become.
Asamoah is motivated by 2 Peter 1:3 which says, "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness."
She feels that, since God has already given her everything she needs, she just needs to make use of the gifts he has given her.
“Just waking up knowing that, ‘Hey, today I have the chance to exist in this world and exist in this place,’ gets me going,” Asamoah said.
Over her years at Taylor, Asamoah has been challenged to make her faith her own. She has learned she can’t live off someone else’s faith or her parents’ faith; she must generate her own walk with God. The Taylor community has encouraged her faith because of how many people around her she sees are on fire for God.
“I love walking around campus and seeing people praying together and encouraging each other,” Asamoah said. “We don't have to do this, but we do, and that just encourages me to be that person.”
As graduation draws closer day by day, Asamoah can’t believe it is already happening.
She looks back on her days with gratitude.
“Taylor, in all its glory and fallen glory, is an amazing place that we have to take advantage of in the time that we have,” she said.
