From Lagos to Lake Ontario, Olusola Fawehinmi is making his mark in American real estate. The Nigerian-born MBA student at SUNY Oswego has been selected as one of just 10 students nationwide to join the 2025 Student Leaders Program of the Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM).
Zig Diaries
| Education
Date: Thursday, 04 September 2025
Time: 15:45 WAT
Location: 📍 Oswego, United States
The program offers on-demand classes, leadership workshops, and high-level networking with future leaders and industry professionals. For Fawehinmi, the opportunity is not only a career accelerator but also a chance to test and showcase his skills on an international stage.
“It’s preparing us to be future leaders in real
estate and also introducing us to various parts of the real estate market,”
he said.
His selection came through a link with the university’s Real Estate Conference and has been bolstered by a scholarship that covers 75 percent of other IREM classes. Already, he has put lessons into action, emceeing SUNY Oswego’s graduate-level 3-Minute Thesis competition, thanks to a new course in public speaking.
“It’s a very interesting program. I feel very privileged to be
selected for it,” he added.
Before pursuing his MBA, Fawehinmi built extensive experience in interior design and architecture. He worked with two firms and ran his own studio for five years in Lagos before deciding to deepen his knowledge abroad.
According to him, SUNY Oswego stood out not
only for its location but also for its faculty. “All of the faculty and
staff here are very warm to work with… the classes are very hands-on and
practical,” he noted.
Now serving as a student project manager in the university’s Facility Services Major Projects Department, he contributes to renovations and future developments, working alongside seasoned architects and designers.
His focus is on mixed-use
development, integrating residential, retail and workspace - which he sees as
the future of urban real estate.
For Fawehinmi, every opportunity at Oswego, from TEDxSUNY Oswego to graduate classrooms, reinforces his vision of blending design, business and leadership.
“My eye for detail, design sense and ability to communicate will serve me well in this industry,” he said with quiet confidence.
Fact-Check and
Background Context
The
Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM), headquartered in Chicago with more
than 20,000 members across 40 countries, runs the Student Leaders Program which
annually selects only about 10 business students across the United States,
making Fawehinmi’s inclusion as a Nigerian MBA student especially notable.
SUNY Oswego’s MBA is AACSB-accredited, a
recognition held by fewer than 6 percent of business schools worldwide,
underscoring the competitiveness of the program.
Nigeria itself has a growing pool of young
professionals pursuing global leadership pathways in real estate and
infrastructure, a sector projected by PwC to be central to Africa’s urban
growth.
Lagos, Fawehinmi’s home city, is one of the
continent’s fastest-growing real estate hubs, where demand for mixed-use
developments is accelerating - aligning directly with his academic focus and
career vision.
His selection into this US program therefore reflects both Nigeria’s emerging global footprint in real estate leadership and a broader trend of Nigerian graduate students excelling in competitive international development spaces.
🏷 Tags: Nigeria, SUNY Oswego, MBA, real estate leadership, IREM, #ZigDiariesEducation #Nigeria #RealEstateLeadership #MBA #StudyAbroad #GlobalCareers
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