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Politics of Population

Throughout college, I chose all of my courses for one of three reasons: I need to take them for a requirement, the topic looks interesting, or the topic is something that I am already very interested in.  “Politics of Population” fell into the latter category for me. I was already fascinated by population policy within the context of public health, and was excited to further explore the subject by also looking at it from the perspective of environmental concerns and economics.  The class raised many questions that linger every time I deal with issues of reproductive health and justice within work, volunteer, or academic settings.  Is it ever ok to exert pressure on a woman, even if it is in the name of peace or democracy?  Can social justice sometimes be used as a mask to cover much more pernicious motives?  When is it ok for countries from the Global North to dictate policy in the Global South – or is it always a form of neocolonialism?

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Health Education

I don’t think of myself as somebody interested in advertising, but as I reflect on my growing fascination with health education, I realize that that is what it really is: lots of big and small advertising campaigns.  People don’t just decide to use condoms, for instance, because someone tells them it will protect them from disease.  They respond to marketing and campaigns that make them feel cool or manly or robust using condoms.  You can see the same with messages telling people to quit smoking, use clean needles, or eat more vegetables.  Much of public health work is a science, but health education is often an art.  I think back, for instance, to the many health messaging campaigns I saw in Indonesia trying to tackle false health information, with the intent of influencing safer behavior.  The poster below, for instance, explains that you cannot get HIV from choosing sex partners on the basis of their appearance; drinking or injecting antibiotics, alcohol, or herbal medicine before and after having sex; or washing one’s sex organs after having sex.

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Independent Research Project

My study abroad program had a very unique set-up, where an intensive period of traditional academic courses, was followed by a two month independent research project.   This was a big part of why I chose that particular program over others: I was thrilled at the chance to do research on a topic entirely of my choosing, and with a design of my own shaping.  My initial hope was to focus my research on a public maternal and child healthcare program in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, but even the best laid plans go astray.  Shortly before I was supposed to begin my research, Mt. Merapi erupted, leading to dozens of deaths, the destruction of many villages, and mass evacuation from the city.  Instead, I ended up researching a new provincial universal healthcare program in Bali, called Jaminan Kesehatan Bali Mandara (JKBM).

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Participatory Action Research

When I went to Indonesia for the first time with Haverford’s CPGC, I took a six-week research methodology seminar before being able to sink my teeth into actual unsupervised “real” research.  The course included a revolving door of Indonesian, Australian, and American guest speakers who spoke about everything from journalistic research methods to quantitative surveys.  One of the most inspiring of these speakers talked about participatory action research, or PAR, and the ways in which it is able to simultaneously bring together community participation, action, and research throughout an investigation.  Michelle Fine defines PAR as “an epistemology that assumes knowledge is rooted in social relations and most powerful when produced collaboratively through action.”  Since doing research projects in high school, I’ve thought of social research as more than a tool for acquiring information, but also as a modality to bring about change.  Throughout the seminar, all of the students on the trip had to partner up and carry out a “mini” research project to test drive the methodologies we had been learning.

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Komunitas Pojok

One of the most interesting and important aspects of spending such a long time in Indonesia was forming close friendships with many people my age who I never would have met otherwise.  It always surprise me when people hear about me living in Indonesia, or see pictures from my time there, and make comments about how I must have done such good, important, helpful work with the people I met.  This couldn’t be further from the truth: although I felt like my friendships were for the most part egalitarian, I did receive considerable support from my friends, both in terms making it financially feasible to take time off and live in Indonesia, and in the ways they became important emotional supports.  Many of the people I got to know were part of an informal art community called “Komunitas Pojok,” or “The Community on the Corner.” 

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California EPA

I have never felt the strength of the Bryn Mawr alumnae network  as acutely as I felt it while doing an internships at the California EPA with a Bryn Mawr alumna, a biologist working at the Air Resources Board (ARB).  As somebody interested in public health, I saw many obvious links to topics I had already been interested in, like increased rates of childhood asthma in urban areas. The ARB is in charge of air pollution generally, so they do focus on issues like asthma, but they are the only division officially working to reduce California’s greenhouse gas emissions, and thus do a lot of research on climate change. I already cared about climate change, but had little academic background or understanding, so it felt a little bit like I was being thrust into a new world.  I ended up working on the “State Implementation Plan” on regional haze for the federal EPA, and learned more about the science and politics of haze than I ever imagined.

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Community Gardening

Before moving to West Philly about a year and a half ago, I had never planted, weeded, or harvested anything.  It seems somewhat ironic that my move from a suburban campus with lots of fields perfect for gardening to an urban neighborhood with little green space would precipitate my interest in gardening.  But, in actuality, my neighborhood is home to many small community gardens.  Right near my house, for instance, is a community garden that works with the elementary school across the street, so kids can both have fun working in the garden and learn about different plants at the same time.  My neighborhood is also home to some of the gardens affiliated with the “Philly Food Forests” movement, a group of rogue gardeners who find vacant lots around the city and transform them into gardens that provide fresh produce and herbs for surrounding communities.

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Learning in Prison

As part of my 360 I had the opportunity to participate in a seven week art workshop with women in a Philadelphia prison.  The experience was so recent that it is hard to step back and figure what it actually meant for both me and my classmates to be doing art together in that space.  I went into the class thinking that it would be an exercise in shared learning about tough political and social issues like systemic racism, racialized incarceration, and the school-to-prison pipeline. I’ve long been interested in restorative justice, particularly in relation to my work in the HIV field, and the course seemed to tie in perfectly with some of my other academic interests.  I was also excited because I saw the class as an opportunity to share some of the ideas I have learned in a privileged college setting with people who might not otherwise have access.

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Students for Immigrant Justice

One of the most important things I have done throughout my time at Bryn Mawr is help to start the Students for Immigrant Justice group on campus, and to push for immigrant rights both at Bryn Mawr and around the country.  My contribution is small and paltry compared to what some of my classmates have done – many of whom are immigrants themselves – but I still feel like my small steps of solidarity mean something.  Last spring, in February, 2012, a plenary resolution calling for the just treatment of undocumented students at Bryn Mawr was postponed.  One of the main changes we were calling for was a statement from the Admissions office stating their willingness to receive applications from undocumented immigrant students.  After plenary, our student group started a campus-wide petition, and got enough signatures to convince admissions to add a new page on undocumented applicants on their website.  Much of our campus work has been paralleled with larger rallies, protests, and sit-ins looking at national immigration policy, and the unfair treatment of people incarcerated in federal detention centers.

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TPAC Americorps

Serving as an AmeriCorps service member with The Philadelphia AIDS Consortium’s (TPAC) ACTS Program was an important stepping stone to the HIV work I do today.  I had the opportunity to do a lot of direct service work for the first time, in case management, HIV prevention, and HIV testing, but also took part in a year-long training program.  My AmeriCorps training ran the gamut from looking at access to social services, to effective intervention strategies, to cultural competency.  While all of the topics we covered over the course of the year were important, and have helped me immensely in doing subsequent work, I was also left with many questions, some of which I feel embarrassed to admit.

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