My name is Felister Nyacuru.
I am a citizen of the Republic of Kenya,
and I am studying Master of Laws in Oil and Gas with Professional Skills.
My ambition in life is
to climb the highest professionally and career-wise as I can.
Today I sit in the office of the Attorney General
as a Senior State Counsel,
and in the future,
I may want to be the Attorney General of the Republic of Kenya.
Yes.
Aberdeen has had an experience of the oil and gas sector for half a century.
It is a place where real knowledge is there.
You're actually taught by the experts themselves.
In fact, they use their own books to teach.
That is not an experience you can get in many parts of the world.
We teach primarily, not exclusively,
but primarily upstream oil and gas law.
So it's about exploration and production activity.
So the law that relates to the discovery of the assets, licensing,
or other sort of state interaction with the private sector.
We look at that from a regulatory perspective,
and we also look at it from a commercial perspective.
We also look at it from a social perspective.
One of the elephants in the room with oil and gas is there are countries
that should have become really, really rich and really, really successful
because they've got enormous amounts of a very, very valuable natural resource,
and it hasn't worked out well for them.
It's known as the curse of natural resources.
We tackle that head on.
We think it would be remiss not to look at that.
The courses have complemented each other.
What you do not get from this course actually is covered in this other course,
and it's like a seamless connectivity.
So all of them, starting from the state-controlled hydrocarbons,
going to international energy and environmental law,
climbing up to contracting in hydrocarbon resources
and then the arbitrations part of it.
All of them, they complement each other.
You will learn through lectures and reading.
I mean, these are obviously important elements.
You'll learn through seminars. You'll learn from guest lectures.
And you'll learn through skills exercises as well, of course.
You'll learn from your peers, we've got a very diverse student group.
So different students bring in experiences from their own jurisdictions.
That's a very powerful way of learning.
Before I came here, I worked in a design office
of an international, US-based law firm.
The reason why I chose Professional Skills, and what attracted me the most,
was this idea that you could get teaching
which would bridge the gap between theory and practice.
And from my personal experience, that's one of the crucial phases
in growing as a professional.
Coming from a theoretical context, theoretical environments,
so understanding the substantive content of an issue
but not being able to deliver it.
We work in groups, and we are asked to analyse
all the legal aspects of a potential investment
in a hydrocarbon prospect.
So in this first week, we learnt how to engage with our colleagues,
work under time constraints, deliver reports and finally a presentation.
In the second week after that,
we were guided through the negotiation process,
we were taught how to negotiate.
The University of Aberdeen has been a fantastic environment.
I mean, the level of support,
in the lecture hall and outside the lecture hall,
is just amazing.
You can just ask questions, you can debate with the professors.
They are very, very open to new ideas, to new suggestions,
and they guide you through their answers,
and you can just discuss about anything which is on your mind.
I'm always reluctant to claim student success.
'Cause it's not our success, it's their success.
But the fact of the matter is
that a lot of our alumni are now in very senior positions
in state national oil companies.
In senior advising positions with major law firms,
with major accountancy firms.
Helping to drive policy,
either back in their own country,
or they've moved to other countries and taken up senior government jobs.
The feedback that we get from a lot of our alumni
is that the Aberdeen degree,
it really made a difference for them. It got them somewhere.
With a bit of luck, in three years' time,
I'd like to be providing legal counsel to international oil companies.
I feel, as many do, that the energy sector will change,
and will change dramatically in the future.
My ambition in life is to be part of that change.
In three years' time, I would want to be Dr Felister Nyacuru.
I am very happy I chose Aberdeen.
In fact, given another chance,
I would choose Aberdeen again and again and again.
I am very happy.
By getting all this here, now,
it just cuts the learning curve.
You have a head start.
This is the reason why I chose Professional Skills.