A smart kid but unaware of it, Daudi was a black preteen boy growing up in the American Midwest in the late 1970s. He was also the first-born son of African immigrants. He struggled academically and soon found himself in remedial reading in the Toledo public school system. His parents, like most African immigrant parents, had high academic expectations of their son, but Daudi just couldn't seem to measure up in part because of his unrecognized ADHD. They tried everything they could think of to help their son flourish in school, so they placed him in a nearly all-white private Catholic school even though they were Baptist. That didn't seem to help. Things only got worse for Daudi when his parents decided to move the family to Kenya, his ancestral home. Shortly after the move, he performed so poorly in the required mathematics entrance test that he was denied admission into the public school near their new home and where his three younger siblings would attend. It didn't look like Daudi would ever become a successful student, let alone a surgeon back in America.
Underestimated is a personal memoir about self-discovery and an academic turnaround. It's about overcoming adversity, finding one's true calling and making a meaningful impact against the odds.