Get to know Olwethu Myeza, 25, Full Stack Developer

The Standard Bank Bursary Programme has helped elevate the lives of many young people in South Africa. Olwethu Myeza, 25-year-old Full Stack Developer, is among those fortunate enough to have crossed paths with this programme. 

The bursary fund is designed to promote academic excellence and shape the next generation of African talent and African leaders within South Africa and the continent at large. Bursary beneficiaries are required to work for Standard Bank if in the event they receive an offer of employment by the bank upon graduation. 

Having grown up in Ivory Park, he places an emphasis on how Standard Bank helped him change his mindset from seeing what is around him to seeing the possibilities and the potential of living his dreams. Olwethu also credits his mother for helping him and his siblings through the challenges they encountered while growing up. While they faced these trying times, he states that there was never a day they went to bed without food.

Like many of the graduates and learners that are accepted into the programmes, Olwethu Myeza (25) grew up in a community where most students don’t know where to start with an education application and are often restricted by the constraints of their financial positions. 

“Ivory Park is a small place where the mindset is limited,” he says, adding that the opportunity he received from Standard Bank to study Computer Science and Computer Games Development has not only changed his life but served as proof to others within his community “that it is something we can dream of and attain”. 

Myeza, says he learnt that exact lesson. “It has also created a way for me to provide for my family. My little brother can live in slightly better conditions than me and my mother doesn’t have to grind as hard, leaving the house at 5.30 for work every morning, selling Avon products and anything else to survive.”

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