Karen Patterson, a cellist from Yellow Springs, Ohio, spends part of each year teaching at the Musical Society of Nigeria in Lagos, Nigeria. When she was searching for a place for her students to transfer to after earning two-year degrees at the MUSON school, she immediately thought of the University of Dayton.

Patterson set up a meeting with Sharon Gratto, the head of UD's music department.

What Patterson did not know is that Gratto was on the founding board of MUSON in the 1980s. Gratto had not heard about the school for two decades until Patterson came to her office.

"It was a rather emotional experience to see the school's prospectus and the photographs of the building and school board members, students and activities," Gratto said in a press release. "It's an incredible story of coincidence. It almost seems that things were meant to happen that way."

Paul Ogunboye and Oluwafemi Ogebule are two of the three students who came to UD from MUSON last September to study music.

"We want to say thank you to her [Gratto] for this great opportunity that she gave us," Ogunboye said. "And we have not regretted coming to UD."

"At all," Ogebule said.

Ogebule has played the clarinet for 12 years and has hopes of one day becoming a performer. Ogunboye has been playing piano for 13 years and wants to be a composer; he has already composed a Christmas song, titled "Fun Wa" ("For Us)," that UD music majors performed.

"Why I am here is to learn, to find things out and to apply it to things back home," Ogebule said. "Give what I have, take what they have, put things together and see how I can put that in my kind of music playing, a fusion of African and American coming together."

While the students said they are enjoying their time at UD, they don't know how much longer they'll be able to stay.

"You can plan for tomorrow, but you can't predict tomorrow," Ogebule said. "Our sponsors, they are willing to sponsor us, but they are facing financial challenges that made them say 'for now I might not be able to do what I promised you.'"

Ogunboye and Ogebule have been looking for any methods to continue their schooling.

"It really wears you down," Ogunboye said. "I mean, you want to read. You want to study."

UD did allow the students to register for classes for this semester even though they were not able to pay their full tuition yet.

"Two of the students are having trouble with money even though they have some sponsors," Gratto said. "There just isn't enough funding for them."

"Even if the school can't help us, we want to say a big, big, big thank you to the president of the school," Oluwafemi said. "Letting us register shows us how much they care for us, and we are really grateful. And even that shows what UD is all about."

The students said the only thing they can do now is go to class and continue to pursue their music degrees.

"My purpose in life is music," Ogunboye said. "Like Stravinsky said, 'This is what I was meant for, this is why I exist.'"