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Global Inequities
2001 - 2002
EPIIC Colloquium Members

Sam Abrams

Mr. Abrams is a freshman who comes to Tufts from upstate New York. Mr. Abrams is currently studying engineering. Since his arrival at Tufts, he has become interested in pursuing research on multinational corporations. Mr. Abrams is also considering studying liberal arts exclusively.


Alice Alisme

Ms. Alisme is an alumna of Somerville High School and currently a first year student at Tufts University. She loves cooking and playing soccer. When she finished high school she was considering majoring in agriculture but as Tufts does not offer an agriculture major she is reconsidering her course of study.


Fiorella Aller

Ms. Aller is a senior, majoring in international relations under the thematic cluster of Global Conflict, Cooperation and Justice. She was born in Lima, Peru but was raised in New York. She is trilingual speaking Spanish, English, and French. Ms. Aller has been working with the United Nation Development Program, Office of Development Studies as a consultant in her field, for the past 3 years. She has been able to submerse herself in the exchange of ideas and resolutions in various UN and UNDP conferences. At Tufts, she is currently the Senior Class Co-Marshall and has been recognized as a Senior Class Leader. She has been nominated as a member of the Senior Class Leadership Corps. Her career goals are to pursue a masters degree in International Relations (specifically in the area of Conflict Resolution) and earn a degree in International Law. She hopes to continue her career with the United Nations next summer at its headquarters in Geneva.


Lana Asfour

Ms. Asfour is a 20 year old junior double majoring in economics and international relations. She is Palestinian but attended high school in the United Arab Emirates. She speaks Arabic, English and French. Her academic interests include economic development, politics of the Middle East and Francophone literature. She has been interning at Solomon Smith Barney since February of 2001. Her work there entails research report analysis, developing financial plans for clients and marketing retirement plans for companies. At Tufts, she is active in the Arab Students Association and is a member of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars. She would eventually like to pursue graduate studies at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Her hobbies include reading, writing, playing tennis, swimming and traveling.


Amy Baron

Ms. Baron is a senior with a major in biology and minor in child development. During a semester aboard, she studied Spanish, comparative ecology, and rural education in Ecuador which led to a greater interest in pursuing studies of social justice and environmental issues on both a global and local level. Her past experience in these areas include environmental education and land stewardship work at environmental NGOs such as the Nature Conservancy and the Peconic Land Trust, as well as volunteering with the Latin America Action Program to educate Boston's community on issues affecting the region and immigrant populations. At Tufts, Amy is involved with campus activist groups and is a manager of the non-profit Oxfam Café.


Shaharris Beh

Mr. Beh is of Malay, Chinese, Turkish, and Burmese descent. He is a first-year undergraduate student interested in political science, economics, and international relations. He was born and raised in Malaysia but moved to Canada when he was eight. He returned to Malaysia seven years later, spending his final two years of high school in an international school. He volunteered regularly at a local daycare center for mentally and physically handicapped children, and worked on the planning committees of the Habitat For Humanity chapter and the school's Who Cares? charity organization. He can juggle and likes penguins.


Nicole Bores

Ms. Bores is a senior double majoring in Sustainable Development and Environmental Studies with a minor in Africa and the New World. She spent last year studying in Ecuador and Uganda, and is currently working on her senior thesis dealing with the role of outsiders in development. Her activities include her post as treasurer of the Leonard Carmichael Society, a campus community service organization, and an internship with Grassroots International. She has volunteered in many parts of the world with several groups, she did dolphin research in Spain, she studied pesticide use research in Costa Rica, and worked with Habitat for Humanity in Botswana.


Robby Borton

Mr. Borton is a junior, expecting to major in either international relations or political science. He is interested in international issues of justice, sustainable development, and the environment especially pertaining to American foreign policy. He has participated in community building and environmental programs in Nicaragua and has worked with ESL students in the Boston Area through the SCALE program. He likes to do outdoor activities- backpacking, sailing, biking, and a wide variety of sports. He would like to pursue a career in international politics or in an international NGO relating to his aforementioned interests.


Neil Blumenthal

Mr. Blumenthal is a senior and a double major in international relations and history. He spent last year aboard studying in Buenos Aires first semester and Madrid second semester. He is proficient in Spanish. Some of his most recent experiences include an internship in labor law at an Argentinean law firm, an internship in Health, Education, Labor and Pension (H.E.L.P.) at Senator Kennedy's office and an internship with a leading information technology consulting firm. On-campus, he is a member of the Senior Class Leadership Corps and Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity. His immediate-future career ambitions involve long-term strategic planning for the United Nations.


Alexander Busse

Mr. Busse is currently a sophomore at Tufts University majoring in international relations. He was born in Johannesburg, South Africa and lived there for 6 years until moving to Geneva, Switzerland for 3 years whilst leaning French. Subsequently he moved to Bonn, Germany where he graduated from a German school and attended his military service in Cologne. In Germany he played on the German National Baseball Team for 4 years and participated in many competitive international tournaments in American and Europe. Over the years he still has remained close contact with South Africa as he still has family in Cape Town he visits yearly. He is looking to conduct first hand research on a development project in Soweto over Thanksgiving break this year. As he is learning Spanish now he would like to spend his next summer in South America and go abroad to Spain during his Junior year. His career plans are to get involved in development planning of underdeveloped countries through a multinational institution.


Kate Davenport

Ms. Davenport is a senior at Tufts University with a major in history and a minor in child development. She was born and raised in Richmond, Virginia. She has four half brothers and sisters ages 13, 12, 11, and 10. During the fall of her senior year in high school, she studied abroad in Beijing and traveled throughout China and Vietnam. It was a life altering experience for her that initiated her interest in globalization, inequity, international relations, and human rights. Raised as a Quaker, she spent the past 5 years working at a Quaker camp that espouses the beliefs of non-violence, cooperation, and acceptance. Her Quaker upbringing has influenced many of her activities. Last year she spent her spring semester in Harare, Zimbabwe living with a Shona family and spent time traveling in Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique and Kenya. Her experiences have altered her world-view and increased her desire to study globalization, inequality and human rights. She looks forward to attending law school, studying international human rights and continuing to work in the field, understanding and participating in the world around her.


Jana Frey

Ms. Frey is a senior majoring in sociology with a minor in Russian. She enjoys living in different places and hence spent two years in England, one year in Russia, seven months in Tanzania and 7 months in Morocco and is now spending her third year in the United States, as she is originally from Germany. In all these places, but particularly Russia, Tanzania and Morocco, she did various kinds of voluntary work with children. She has taught English and German, and run a variety of afternoon activities- ranging from arts and crafts projects to sports to drama to environmental issues- for children in orphanages, after-school programs, social clubs, and summer camps. Throughout her travels she has acquired a kind of understanding of the many inter-cultural misunderstanding that often occur. Ms. Frey is fluent in English and German, and can communicate well in French and Russian. Currently, she is interning at the American Anti-Slavery Group in Boston where she is coordinating outreach.


John-Paul Ghobrial

Mr. Ghobrial is a member of the class of 2002 with a double major in international relations and French. Last summer, he served as a Charles G. Koch Fellow with the Institute for Humane Studies, a public policy organization affiliated with the CATO Institute. There, he carried out research on the effects of labor and environmental provisions in the text of the Jordan Free Trade Agreement. He also interned with Defenders of Property Rights, the only public interest legal foundation dedicated exclusively to the protection of private property rights in the United States. After graduation, J.P. intends to pursue graduate studies, completing both a law degree (JD) and an advanced doctoral degree in Modern Middle Eastern Studies. He is primarily interested in the way in which the singularity of Arab culture may influence international politics and economic development in the region. Particularly, he will focus on the way in which Arab governments have balanced attempts to liberalize their economies and become party to human rights treaties within the constraints of Muslim political thought. Ultimately, he would like to work within the framework of international law to develop a lasting peace and a foundation for economic prosperity within the Arab region.


Beth Ginsberg

Ms. Ginsberg is a senior majoring in sociology and minoring in peace and justice studies. She has worked with Physicians for Human Rights on the United States Campaign to Ban Landmines ("USCBL"), projects involving student awareness and website development. She organized a protest demonstration at Tufts for the USCBL in December 2000 and she also volunteers at Shortstop, Inc., a children's homeless shelter in Somerville, Massachusetts. Ms. Ginsberg spent last semester in Australia studying at the University of New South Wales in Sydney and traveled thought Australia, New Zealand, and Thailand. She spends her summers as a camp counselor at a summer camp team and has competed nationally in freestyle skiing since age 14. Her future plans involve working in the non-governmental sector and pursuing interests in sustainable development, community organizing, and human rights.


figure 1.1
Joseph Gulezian

Mr. Gulezian is currently a freshman. He was born in Chicago and raised in Oak Park , Illinois. He is undecided about a possible major though he is leaning towards international relations. He spent last summer reading , writing, working and living in Shakespeare and Co., a bookstore in the heart of Paris' Latin Quarter, and he likes apples.(see figure 1.1)


Grace Hollister

Ms. Hollister is a senior majoring in international relations and French. She spent her junior year studying in Paris, concentrating on French literature, French art history, and political science. She also interned in the communication department of the Paris office of the consulting firm Bain and Company. She was able to travel extensively throughout Europe during her time there, and her next initiative involves studying the role of women in politics and development in Africa, where she hopes to travel for research purposes.


Gina Jibrin

Ms. Jibrin is a junior creating a plan of study in Health and Human Rights, with a minor in Arabic. She's of Nigerian and Indian decent, having grown up in Nigeria. She is knowledgeable in Spanish, French, Hausa, Malayalam, and Arabic. She is studying the correlations between Public Health, Human Rights, and Global Inequalities with a minor in Arabic. She devised a method for correlating El Niño Sea Surface Temperature with Disease (Dengue Fever) in San Juan, Puerto Rico; she has also done work related to climate variability with the Indian Monsoons. She's carried out research related to malaria and onchocerciasis in Plateau State, Nigeria. Last summer, Gina directed the Mission Hill Summer Program (MHSP)--an summer urban program working with 90 "at-risk" youth, ages 6-13. Most of the youth with whom she worked lived in comprised communities challenged by low-income levels, high crime rates, drug and alcohol abuse, single-parent households, and a general lack and fragmentation of social and educational services. She's been working in Mission Hill for the past two years, and hopes to continue to mobilize the healthy development and empowerment of the youth and families within the Mission Hill and Alice Taylor housing developments. In her free time she loves people-watching, eating, taking long walks, and playing soccer.


Lauren Katz

Ms. Katz is a junior majoring in international relations and peace and justice studies. She spent her junior year in high school studying in Israel and speaks Hebrew. Lauren spent last summer in Rome interning at the National Italian American Foundation. At Tufts, she is in the Traveling Treasure Trunk -- the University's children's theater group, and completed her first triathlon this summer in Boston. Her interests lie primarily in gender inequality and public health.


Caroline Kelly

Ms. Kelly is a senior at Tufts University majoring in political science and participating in the Community Health Program. She was born and raised in the suburbs and rural areas of upstate New York, outside of Albany. Her interest in international politics and world events has been heightened over the past two years as she studied various international organizations in Geneva and interned in the British Parliament for a member of the House of Commons. Currently, Caroline is particularly interested in issues surrounding the provisions of AIDS treatment in Sub-Saharan Africa. After graduation she hopes to join the Peace Corps and to alter pursue a Master of Public Health degree.


Anna Kordunskaya

Ms. Kordunskaya is a first-year student with an undeclared major in international relations. Having moved to USA from Moscow four years ago, she is fluent in both English and Russian and greatly interested in the history of Eastern Europe, especially in the political and social reverberations of the breakdown of the Soviet Union and the current position of Russia on the world stage. In the future, she is planning to spend a semester in Moscow, as well as to participate in Tufts in Tübingen program to study abroad in Germany. She is also interested in the world literature and arts, and is an avid member of the Tufts Ballroom Dance Team. Following her graduation, she plans to move back to Moscow to pursue a career in international relations and to represent her country in the struggle for greater equality in the world.


Kelly Morrison
Ms. Morrison is a senior studying international relations and sociology. Last spring she studied abroad in Paris and speaks fluent French. She currently works with Oxfam America and is interested in issues of human rights and equality. This winter Ms Morrison would like to travel to Senegal to do research on the role of women in grassroots development as hopes to work in this field after graduate school.


Anne O'Loughlin
Ms. O'Loughlin is a senior pursuing a dual degree in history and Spanish. Fluent in Spanish and proficient in Italian, she spent most of last year in Europe, where she studied art, literature, and culture in Venice, Italy and Madrid, Spain. She spent the summer in a mall, rural Spanish village teaching small children English. Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, Ms. O'Loughlin sings with the Tufts University Chorale, as well as volunteers for the Animal Aid and ESL programs of the Leonard Carmichael Society and for the New England Aquarium. She also plays classical piano, is an avid scuba diver, and all-around adventure-seeker. Her post-graduate interests lie in pursuing research of indigenous peoples in Central and South America, and eventually obtaining a degree in International Human Rights Law.


Graziella Reis-Trani
Ms. Reis-Trani is a junior pursuing a major in international relations with a focus on global conflict, cooperation and justice. She is fluent in Portuguese and proficient in Spanish. While at Tufts she has served as the Vice President of the International Club, where among other things she was responsible for setting up a culture show that incorporated all the different culture clubs on campus. She has also been a host advisor for International Orientation. Her professional experience includes working with the Quaker United Nations Office where she worked on indigenous issues as well as water related issues. After graduation, she plans to pursue further education and a career in international relations.


Sophie Sahaf
Ms. Sahaf is a senior double majoring in international relations and Spanish. She recently spent a semester studying abroad in Santiago, Chile. She is fluent in English and Spanish, and proficient in Kashmiri. In Chile, she interned with Amnesty International, working on the campaigning and public relations committees. She worked with members to organize conferences and recruit university students. She also visited squatter settlements to compile data and work with female groups in their organization and mobilization. Sophia is also actively involved with the Kashmiri American Council (KAC,) which aims to create a peaceful resolution to the conflict in the Jammu and Kashmir state of India. She also enjoys traveling, reading, and baking.


Natica Smith
Ms. Smith is a junior who majors in computer science and minors in political science. She is of Nigerian descent and has lived in several states in the U.S as well as in Nigeria. She is fluent in French and proficient in Anang/Ibibio. She is interested in civil rights of minorities, including women. While living in Nashville, Tennessee, she served as the Vice President of the Akwa Ibom Youth Association, an association for all young Nigerians in the Middle Tennessee region who came from Akwa Ibom State in southeastern Nigeria. As Vice President, she helped organize events for the youth promoted unity among them to enable them to serve in the adult sector of the Akwa Ibom association, which is a nationwide association. Her work experience has included interning at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C where she worked for the Deputy Director of the Science and Human Rights Department collecting meta-data on records of human rights offenses in El Salvador and Kosovo. She currently remains employed as a programming consultant for AAAS doing simple data munging tasks and relational database implementation and analysis for Patrick Ball. Her interests include dancing - she dances and choreographs for Tufts Dance Collective and has performed with Spirit of Color. Other athletic interests include cross-country and track. Ms. Smith plans on attending law school and was a member of the Tufts Mock Trial Team during the year they won 2 trials at the regional competition held at Yale University. She hopes to pursue a career in government and/or in a non-governmental organization abroad as well as an initial career in software development in Perl with Linux.


Pon Souvannaseng
Ms. Souvannaseng is currently an undeclared freshman interested in possibly double majoring in history and political science. She deeply enjoys writing, film, and live music in her free time. Currently, she is learning to play the guitar and experiments with web design. A California girl at heart, she is of Chinese descent, but is Thai influenced. She is a member of the concert board and the Tufts Democrats, and is interested in becoming involved with the Democratic National Party. In the past, Ms Souvannaseng has spent her time working with the internet company Helpcity.com to bring about community awareness and development through the use of a web-based medium. She spent the past summer interning in the consumer credit and lending department for East West Bank and assisted in coaching a speech and debate program for high school teens. She studied classical piano and music theory for over eight years, and likes animals. In the future, Ms. Souvannaseng would like to earn a law degree.


Jordi Timerman
Ms. Timerman was born in New York to Argentine parents, and has lived in Buenos Aires for the past twelve years. Currently she is a freshman. She is, as of now, undecided about a major; she is considering history, political science, international relations, or peace and justice studies. Over the past few years she has developed a strong interest in pursuing a journalistic career, although she is by no means convinced that this is the path she will pursue. In following with that she was an active participant in her high school newspaper, she was the editor during her senior year, as well as interning with the Buenos Aires Herald (the largest English-speaking newspaper in Argentina) last summer. At Tufts she is writing for the Tufts Daily and also volunteering at the Oxfam Cafe.


Christie Turner
Ms. Turner is a senior majoring in international relations. She is a writing fellow at Tufts and works on the monthly poetry magazine, Optimus Prime. She spent last year in England and hopes to spend next year in Chile. Ultimately, she would like to work for an international organization or continue her studies and work in the academic world. She spent a lot of her free time writing poetry, prose, and fiction and has also done a lot of studio art- she is currently working on developing her photography skills. Ms Turner is from New Hampshire, where she would almost always rather be, she has a brother who is her best friend, and a thirteen and a half year old Scottish Terrier.


Elaine Wang
Ms. Wang is completing her double major in international relations and art history at Tufts after returning from a year aboard at the University of Bologna in Italy. Born and raised in Connecticut, Ms. Wang attended boarding school in Exeter, New Hampshire. Currently, she resides in San Francisco bay area where this summer she worked as an intern in the marketing department of United Commercial Bank; an institution that facilitates the financial sector for new immigrants to the area. Ms. Wang has previously interned at Christie's New York in the 19th century and Impressionist arts department and at EY Laboratories --a producer of one of the components of HIV tests in San Mateo, CA. She also spent a semester working with Congresswoman Nancy Johnson (CT-6) on Capitol Hill. She is fluent in both English and Italian with Mandarin, Shanghainese and Cantonese and French comprehension. Ms. Wang has been a student of the piano, violin, and the harp for numerous years and was a former pole-vaulter with both the Exeter and Tufts varsity track teams. Next year, she plans to begin working towards her JD degree.


Shaun Young
Mr. Young is in his second year at Tufts University and is pursuing a major in Political Science with a concentration in political philosophy, and a minor in English. Originally, he is from the Bay Area where he attended San Francisco University High School. In the past, he has organized student access to Speaker Series, been published in poetry anthologies, and has played basketball for Tufts. He is particularly interested in multicultural and biracial issues, the fusion of hip hop and jazz, and antique typewriters. Currently, he is planning to visit Johannesburg, South Africa to witness firsthand the applicability of Hernando de Soto's theories on property rights of informal settlers.

*colloquium members not featured Jamie Carlson, Yianna Della Tolla , Julian Feldman, Dan Handel, Douglass Hansen, Belinda Jacobus, Dina Karam, Jared Levant, Sara Standish, and Amanda Watson

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