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Two
Human Rights Program Summer Fellows Honored by the American Bar
Association
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| (L. to R.) Jessica Filion '03 and
Rute Pinhel '03 at a public presentation by the human rights program
summer fellows last semester. |
Two
summer fellows in the human rights program, Rute Pinhel ’03 and
Jessica Filion ’03, were praised by leading immigration attorneys at a
recent meeting of the American Bar Association (ABA) leadership
committee. The two
fellows spent much of last summer working for the ABA’s Immigration
Pro Bono Development and Bar Activation Project in collaboration with
the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition (CAIR). Their research
and advocacy were instrumental in ending the use of the Virginia Beach
jail by the Immigration and
Naturalization Service for holding immigration
detainees.
The human rights summer
fellowship program sponsors qualified first-year students, sophomores,
and juniors who are interested in
the opportunity to perform human rights advocacy work for
nongovernmental human rights organizations during the summer months.
Through the program, students have worked at
such organizations as Amnesty International, Physicians for Human
Rights, International Rescue Committee, and the National Coalition
Against the Death Penalty.
“While at CAIR I was able to experience first-hand the plight
of people in INS detention,” Filion says. This aspect of the program
impacted me the most because it was so close to me, being the daughter
of two immigrants.” Pinhel came away from the program with similar
impressions of what she calls “an incredible opportunity and one that
will shape the rest of my academic career and the rest of my life.”
Pinhel describes her work
as both “eye-opening and heart-wrenching, because it allowed me to
witness first-hand how this intolerance has shaped the immigration laws
of this country and the
influence it has on the unjust and inhumane treatment of immigrants.”
“Because of their
fabulous work, the INS closed this facility,” says Maryam Elahi,
director of the human rights program.
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LEARNING |
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Asia Grabska '03 |
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Making the most of opportunities |
 Joanna
“Asia” Grabska ’03 has always wanted to be a doctor. As a child she
was so curious about biology and anatomy that she once filched a piece of
chicken from the dinner table to examine it under a microscope. At Trinity
she has made the most of opportunities that will help prepare her for a
career in medicine. In addition to pursuing an appropriate premedical
curriculum, Grabska took a training course for emergency medical technicians
and this year is a member of Trinity’s Emergency Response Team. This
semester, Grabska has earned a spot as a Trinity Health Fellow. Through the
Health Fellows program, which includes both a seminar component and an
internship, she will work closely with a neonatalogist at Hartford Hospital.
Grabska’s major research project there will focus on the heel stick
procedure commonly used to draw blood from infants on the hospital’s
Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
Where
in the world
Grabska
knows she wants to be a doctor. The question is where. As an international
studies major with a concentration in Latin America and the Caribbean, she
is considering practicing in that part of the world. Associate Professor of
History Dario A. Euraque, who taught Grabska’s first-year seminar and who
has been her adviser ever since, says, “She certainly ranks as one of the
best students I’ve ever had in my 11 years here.” Euraque says Grabska
is “very persistent and disciplined,” but also has “a sense of fun.”
Last semester, Grabska took Euraque’s senior seminar course on “Woman
and Man in Latin American History” though she is only a junior.
Grabska’s final paper for the course explored gender and politics in the
Pinochet era and involved interviewing a Chilean woman from the Hartford
area as one of her primary sources.
This
semester, Grabska will again tackle fieldwork in Hartford as part of a
research project spearheaded by Associate Professor of International Studies
Janet L. Bauer. The focus is on half a dozen refugee groups in Hartford,
including Cubans, Russians, and Bosnians. Bauer and her student
collaborators will examine the cultural adaptations of different generations
of women and the role that non-governmental organizations play in assisting
them. While other students are conducting the interviews, Grabska will be
the team’s photographer, charged with creating a photographic record of
refugee life.
This
research project, combined with her course work, will prepare Grabska well
for an environmental studies program in Costa Rica this summer and for a
semester at Trinity’s global site in Santiago, Chile, next fall.
An international
sensibility
Born
in Poland, Grabska has lived in this country since the beginning of high
school. But when she came to Trinity, she strongly identified with “the
international student who is experiencing culture shock.” This sensibility
prompted her to become a leader in the PRIDE (Promoting Respect for
Inclusive Diversity in Education) program, through which older students act
as mentors to incoming students of diverse backgrounds. As a PRIDE area
coordinator this year, Grabska acts as a resource to other PRIDE leaders.
While
Grabska believes she would have had a solid educational experience had she
stayed in Poland, she appreciates one key difference offered by American
liberal arts colleges: access to the faculty. Back home, she says,
professors and students have a more formal and limited relationship. Here,
her class work has been complemented by collaborative research, informal
intellectual conversation, and other collegial interactions with faculty
members.
On
the whole, she says, “I expected a lot, but I think the opportunities
I’m having have surpassed my expectations.”
– Leslie Virostek
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