CommUNITY Champion: Louisville organization helps connect children from opposite ends of the world
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Updated: 5:52 PM EDT Jun 21, 2019
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STEPHON: IT’S A JOURNEY BACK TO THE MOTHER LAND BY WAY OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA. STACY BAILEY-NDIYAE IS EMPOWERING YOUNG KIDS HERE IN LOUISVILLE AND SIX OTHER COUNTRIES IN AFRICA TO GET THEM PREPARE AS FUTURE ANCESTORS. >> [SINGING] >> WE FOCUS ON THE POWER OF USING AFRICAN HERITAGE CULTURE AS A TOOL TO HELP DEVELOP COMMUNITIES WHERE YOUNG PEOPLE CAN THRIVE STEPHON: BRIDGE KIDS INTERNATIONAL WORKS WITH COMMUNITIES TO CREATE AND CELEBRATE A SENSE OF CULTURE. THEY FOCUS ON THE AFRICAN DIASPORA, WHICH REFERS TO THE DISPERSAL OF AFRICAN PEOPLE THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. >> PART OF THAT, USING THE AFRICAN HERITAGE CULTURE, IS CONNECTING PEOPLE OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA, SO THAT’S AFRICAN AMERICANS, AFRICANS, BUILDING THOSE RELATIONSHIPS, BECAUSE QUITE OFTEN, WE MAY SHARE A NEIGHBORHOOD. WE DEFINITELY SHARE A CITY, AND JUST BECAUSE WE MAY KIND OF LOOK ALIKE, WE DON’T KNOW EACH OTHER. STEPHON: KNOWING WHERE YOU COME FROM IS WHAT’S MOST IMPORTANT HERE STUDENTS LEARNING EARLY HOW TO EMBRACE DIVERSITY AND GO BEYOND WHAT THEY SEE ON A DAY TO DAY BASIS. >> AND THAT’S WHAT WE REALLY WANT. WE WANT PEOPLE FROM THE VARIETY OR THE RANGE OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA BECAUSE WE KNOW IF WE START WITH YOUNG PEOPLE, DEVELOPING THOSE RELATIONSHIPS EARLY ON, THOSE CAN TAKE THEM THROUGH OUT THEIR LIFE STEPHON: STUDENTS LEARNS SON OF EMPOWERMENT TO KEEP THEM UPLIFTED AS THEY LEARN ABOUT VARIOUS PARTS OF THE WORLD. >> FOR ME, WHEN I SEE THAT HAPPENING, NOT ONLY DOES IT GIVE ME HOPE FOR THE FUTURE, BUT IT GIVES ME HOPE FOR THE PRESENT. WE NEED THEM RIGHT NOW, SO WE NEED THEIR IDEAS. WE NEED THEM TO HAVE THE CONFIDENCE THAT THEY CAN STEP UP AND SOMEHOW PARTICIPATE IN THE COMMUNITY. STEPHON: STACY BAILEY-NDIYAE CO FOUNDED BRIDGE KIDS INTERNATIONAL SEVERAL YEARS AGO. THE HEADQUARTERS IS HERE IN LOUISVILLE THEY ALSO OPERATE IN GHANA, MALAWI, RWANDA, KENYA AN SENEGAL. >> IT’S A DREAM COME TRUE. IVE BEEN BLESSED TO SEE SOME OF OUR YOUNG PEOPLE FROM AROUND T WORLD. WE’VE DONE A COUPLE OF BRIDGE KIDS CAMPS IN SENEGAL, AND WE HAD SOME YOUNG PEOPLE FROM LOUISVILLE GO TO THAT AS WELL. STEPHON: THE PROGRAM COVERS ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, THE ENVIRONMENT, WOMEN’S RIGHTS AND HEALTH. BUILDING THESE RELATIONSHIPS EARLY ALLOWS THESE FUTURE ANCESTORS TO LEARN FROM THE PAST AND NAVIGATE THE PRESE >> THE DECISIONS THAT I MAKE NOW ARE ABSOLUTELY CRITICA IT’S KNOWING THAT THEY EXIST ON THIS CONTINUUM AND ITS REALLY IMPORTANT BECAUSE IT GROUN YOUNG PEOPLE AND IT SETS THEIR FACE TOWARDS THE FUT
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CommUNITY Champion: Louisville organization helps connect children from opposite ends of the world
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Updated: 5:52 PM EDT Jun 21, 2019
A local organization is connecting young children back to their roots.Community Champion Stacey Bailey-Ndivae co-founded Bridge Kids International as a way for the children to work with communities to create and celebrate a sense of culture.They focus on the African diaspora, which refers to the dispersal of African people throughout the world.WLKY reporter Stephon Dingle has more.
A local organization is connecting young children back to their roots.
Community Champion Stacey Bailey-Ndivae co-founded Bridge Kids International as a way for the children to work with communities to create and celebrate a sense of culture.
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They focus on the African diaspora, which refers to the dispersal of African people throughout the world.
VIENNA, Jun 21 2019 – Societies must work together to build more tolerance, solidarity and peace within and between nations, said the Executive Director of the Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue, Ambassador Idriss Jazairy, during the 19 June international conference on “From Interfaith, Inter-Civilizational Cooperation to Human Solidarity.” He emphasized that all such societies are built on shared aspirations and not shared ethnicity.
This Geneva Centre was one of the organizers of this major event together with the Baku International Centre for Interreligious and Inter-Civilizational Cooperation and the KAICIID Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue Centre.
It gathered over 200 high-level experts from 30 countries and 10 international organizations. A special message of greeting was extended to the co-organizers of the conference and the participants by the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan HE llham Aliyev during the inaugural ceremony.
As the moderator of the opening and the first plenary sessions, Ambassador Jazairy stated that although the Berlin Wall was demolished in 1989, new physical and virtual walls were being erected which were breaking up societies and multilateralism.
“It is one of the greatest paradoxes of the contemporary world that major world faiths and creeds that all preach human fraternity are being perverted to justify hatred and exclusion. The threat to peoples is not diversity, but poverty. Terrorism has no religion, denomination or nationality. It is a social cancer that affects the whole world,” he said.
To overcome this situation, Ambassador Jazairy highlighted the importance of promoting awareness of both the commonality of values and the specificities of practices of diverse faiths as expressions of enrichment through pluralism. He emphasized that all faiths supported God-given dignity to human beings and the duty of all to uphold it in particular for women and girls and vulnerable groups. Likewise, he recalled that all such faiths equally advocate the love of one’s neighbor.
The Executive Director of the Geneva Centre praised the outcome of the 25 June 2018 World Conference on religions and equal citizenship rights, the World Tolerance Summit organized in November 2018 in Dubai, the historical meeting of 4 February 2019 between the Pope and the Grand Imam of Al Azhar held in Abu Dhabi, and the Fifth World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue held in-May 2019 in Azerbaijan.
In his concluding remarks, the Geneva Centre’s Executive Director underlined that the promotion of equal citizenship rights is the silver-bullet to promote successful societies that manage diversity and stimulate empathy towards the other.
Ambassador Jazairy added: ‘Ethnicity, religious or political affiliations do not convey more rights on some groups than on others. As the US Congress affirmed already in 1782 ‘E pluribus unum.’ This diversity needs to become again the subject of cultural celebration and lay the foundation for social cohesion and the promotion of inclusive societies. There can be no sustainable pursuit of happiness in islands of prosperity surrounded by oceans of poverty.”
The Executive Director of the Geneva Centre concluded his statement by appealing to countries from the Global North and the Global South to jointly promote empathy between different cultures and civilizations and to “speak up together so that the conference message comes out loud and clear and is picked up by politicians who can make it become a reality.”
In the concluding session of the conference, the co-organizers endorsed an outcome declaration welcoming, inter alia, the adoption of the 25 June 2018 World Conference 10-Point Outcome Declaration on “Moving Towards Greater Spiritual Convergence Worldwide in Support of Equal Citizenship Rights” which was sponsored by the Geneva Centre and its partners last year.
The co-organizers likewise adopted a joint message to the President of Azerbaijan HE Ilham Aliyev and to the President of Austria HE Alexander Van der Bellen appealing to both countries to address obstacles to sustainable peace and development, promote inter-civilizational dialogue and to make this conference format replicable at regular intervals in the future.
Today is the 169th day of 2019. There are 196 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT
2010: BP removes chief executive Tony Hayward from day-to-day oversight of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill crisis, a day after he was pummelled by US lawmakers at a hearing.
OTHER EVENTS
1757: Holy Roman Empire forces defeat of Prussia’s King Frederick II in Seven Years War battle of Kollin, now in Czech Republic, and he loses 13,000 of 33,000 troops.
1779: French forces take St Vincent in West Indies from British.
1812: United States declares war against Britain because of restrictions imposed on shipping during the Napoleonic Wars.
1815: British under Duke of Wellington and Prussians under Gerhard von Blucher defeat France’s Napoleon Bonaparte at Waterloo.
1823: King John VI annuls Portuguese Constitution of 1822 after uprisings against his rule and the loss of Brazil.
1900: With the anti-foreign Boxer Rebellion already under way, the dowager empress of China orders all foreigners killed.
1940: General Charles de Gaulle makes his famous BBC broadcast from London, in which he declares himself leader of the “Free French” and urges compatriots to resist Nazi occupation.
1940: Germans capture French port of Cherbourg.
1952: British announce plan to unite Rhodesia and Nyasaland — now Zimbabwe and Malawi — in Central African Federation.
1953: Egypt is proclaimed a republic with General M Naguib as president.
1961: Three princes of Laos meet in Zurich, Switzerland, and agree to form coalition government to unite the war-torn kingdom.
1965: Air Vice-Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky assumes office as premier of South Vietnam and vows to spur war against Viet Cong.
1975: Prince Faisal Ibn Musaed is publicly beheaded in Riyadh for the murder of his uncle, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia.
1985: US space shuttle Discovery, with a Saudi Arabian prince aboard as passenger, launches a satellite for Arab world.
1993: The UN Security Council approves sending 7,600 peacekeepers to six Bosnian cities.
1996: The UN Security Council lifts its embargo of heavy weapons against the former Yugoslav republics, following an arms control agreement in Bosnia.
1997: One of the most reviled figures of the century, the fugitive Cambodian Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, surrenders to his former comrades.
2000: Ethiopia and Eritrea agree to cease hostilities immediately in two-year-old border war that killed, wounded, and displaced thousands.
2001: Some 30,000 Syrian troops pull out of Beirut and redeploy after 25 years. The Syrians were invited into Lebanon in 1976 as part of an Arab peacekeeping force to quell a civil war.
2002: A Palestinian suicide bomber detonates explosives on a bus in Jerusalem, killing himself and at least 19 Israelis, in the deadliest attack in Jerusalem since 1996.
2004: European Union leaders agree on a first-ever constitution for their newly reunited continent, overcoming disputes about power-sharing and national sovereignty.
2008: Zhang Xiaoyan, a woman trapped under rubble for 50 hours in the May 12 earthquake in China, delivers a healthy baby girl in a touching coda to the massive tragedy that killed almost 70,000 people. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says he would bring Osama bin Laden to justice in a way that wouldn’t allow the terrorist mastermind to become a martyr, but that bin Laden might be killed if the US Government found him. (Bin Laden was tracked down and slain by US forces in May 2011 during Obama’s presidency.)
2012: Islamist candidate Mohammed Morsi claims a hollow victory in Egypt’s presidential election just hours after the country’s military rulers strip the office of its most important powers.
2013: The Taliban and the US say they will hold talks on finding a political solution to end nearly 12 years of war in Afghanistan, as the international coalition formally hands over control of the country’s security to the Afghan army and police.
2014: Iraq’s Shiite prime minister extends overtures to his Sunni and Kurdish political rivals as his forces battle Sunni militants over control of the nation’s largest oil refinery and a strategic city near the Syrian border.
2017: Charleena Lyles, a 30-year-old African American mother of four, is shot and killed by two white Seattle police officers after she called 911 to report a burglary; authorities said Lyles had pulled a knife on the officers. Voters give French President Emmanuel Macron’s fledgling party a solid victory in parliamentary elections.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS
Edward Scripps, US newspaper publisher (1854-1926); Anastasia, daughter of Russian czar Nicholas II (1901-1918); Paul McCartney, British singer (1942- ); Thabo Mbeki, South African president (1942- ); Roger Ebert, US film critic (1942-2013); Isabella Rossellini, Italian-born model-actress (1952- ); Tom Bailey, British singer (1957- ).
— AP
Now you can read the Jamaica Observer ePaper anytime, anywhere. The Jamaica Observer ePaper is available to you at home or at work, and is the same edition as the printed copy available at http://bit.ly/epaperlive
On all continents you have the issue of land degradation, and it requires governments, land users and all different communities in a country to be part of the solution. Credit: Albert Oppong-Ansah /IPS
ANKARA, Jun 17 2019 (IPS) – The coming decades will be crucial in shaping and implementing a transformative land agenda, according to a scientist at the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) framework for Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN).
UNCCD-Science Policy Interface co-chair Dr. Mariam Akhtar-Schuster, who spoke with IPS ahead of the start of activities to mark World Day to Combat Desertification (WDCD) on Monday, Jun. 17, said this was one of the key messages emerging for policy- and other decision-makers.
“The main message is: things are not improving. The issue of desertification is becoming clearer to different communities, but we now have to start implementing the knowledge that we already have to combat desertification,” Akhtar-Schuster told IPS.
“It’s not only technology that we have to implement, it is the policy level that has to develop a governance structure which supports sustainable land management practices.”
IPBES Science and Policy for People and Nature found that the biosphere and atmosphere, upon which humanity as a whole depends, have been deeply reconfigured by people.
The report shows that 75 percent of the land area is very significantly altered, 66 percent of the ocean area is experiencing increasing cumulative impacts, and 85 percent of the wetland area has been lost.
“There are of course areas which are harder hit; these are areas which are experiencing extreme drought which makes it even more difficult to sustainably use land resources,” Akhtar-Schuster said.
“On all continents you have the issue of land degradation, so there’s no continent, there’s no country which can just lean back and say this is not our issue. Everybody has to do something.”
Akhtar-Schuster said there is sufficient knowledge out there which already can support evidence-based implementation of technology so that at least land degradation does not continue.
While the information is available, Akhtar-Schuster said it requires governments, land users and all different communities in a country to be part of the solution.
“There is no top-down approach. You need the people on the ground, you need the people who generate knowledge and you need the policy makers to implement that knowledge. You need everybody,” the UNCCD-SPI co-chair said.
“Nobody in a community, in a social environment, can say this has nothing to do with me. We are all consumers of products which are generated from land. So, we in our daily lives – the way we eat, the way we dress ourselves – whatever we do has something to do with land, and we can take decisions which are more friendly to land than what we’re doing at the moment.”
UNCCD-Science Policy Interface co-chair Dr. Mariam Akhtar-Schuster says things are not improving and that the issue of desertification is becoming clearer to different communities. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS
UNCCD Lead Scientist Dr. Barron Joseph Orr said it’s important to note that while the four major assessments were all done for different reasons, using different methodologies, they are all converging on very similar messages.
He said while in the past land degradation was seen as a problem in a place where there is overgrazing or poor management practices on agricultural lands, the reality is, that’s not influencing the change in land.
“What’s very different from the past is the rate of land transformation. The pace of that change is considerable, both in terms of conversion to farm land and conversion to built-up areas,” Orr told IPS.
“We’ve got a situation where 75 percent of the land surface of the earth has been transformed, and the demand for food is only going to go up between now and 2050 with the population growth expected to increase one to two billion people.”
That’s a significant jump. Our demand for energy that’s drawn from land, bio energy, or the need for land for solar and wind energy is only going to increase but these studies are making it clear that we are not optimising our use,” Orr added.
Like Akhtar-Schuster, Orr said it’s now public knowledge what tools are necessary to sustainably manage agricultural land, and to restore or rehabilitate land that has been degraded.
“We need better incentives for our farmers and ranchers to do the right thing on the landscape, we have to have stronger safeguards for tenures so that future generations can continue that stewardship of the land,” he added.
The international community adopted the Convention to Combat Desertification in Paris on Jun. 17, 1994.
At the same time, they will look at the broad picture of the next 25 years where they will achieve land degradation neutrality.
The anniversary campaign runs under the slogan “Let’s grow the future together,” with the global observance of WDCD and the 25th anniversary of the Convention on Jun. 17, hosted by the government of Turkey.
This weekend, more than 9,000 students will graduate from UC San Diego. For many, the path to completion was not an easy one, but through their perseverance and dedication, they made it to the finish line.
From surviving a stroke, to empowering women suffering from perinatal mood and anxiety disorders, and using dance to bring communities together, these outstanding graduates have embodied what it means to be a UC San Diego student. Here are some of their stories:
Erik Abram Hernandez: endures with disability to become human rights hero
MAJOR: Literatures in English
COLLEGE: Eleanor Roosevelt College
Giving back has always been important to Erik Hernandez. Through the Make-A-Wish Foundation, a 15-year-old Hernandez used his wish to provide food and water to children in Africa. This led to the creation of Erik’s Harvest, a program founded by Hernandez that provides education and support to children through community gardens and fish ponds in Zambia, Ethiopia and Malawi. His efforts led him to be recognized by the American Bar Association as a “human rights hero.”
Hernandez was inspired to attend UC San Diego after a memorable field trip in junior high, and thanks to the Chancellor’s Associate Scholarship Program, he was able to do just that. As a first-generation college student and son of immigrants, the scholarship has allowed him to dream big without being burdened by student debt. When coupled with financial aid, the program offers students resources that cover the cost of education, including housing and supplies, making it possible for families and students to avoid loans while earning their undergraduate degree.
The additional resources have been especially important to Hernandez because of his ongoing medical expenses due to a disability. During his time at UC San Diego, Hernandez interned with Congressman Jim Costa as part of the UC Washington Center (UCDC) program and studied abroad in Tokyo at the International Christian University, also known as the Kingdom of Language.
“In D.C., I worked with my fellow staffers to pass a bill that provided millions of dollars to child advocacy centers across the nation,” he said. “The privilege of being able to work for the constituents of district 16 opened my eyes to the value of service to others and the happiness that it brings me.”
As an advocate for human rights, children and the disabled, and being a disabled transfer student himself, Hernandez continues to shatter barriers that perpetuate discrimination and contribute to marginalization. “One of my favorite quotes is by Haben Grima,” he said. “ ‘Disability is not something we overcome, it’s a part of human diversity, it’s something to be tapped into.’ ”
In law school and beyond, Hernandez hopes to use his UC San Diego education to strengthen the legal framework to improve the lives of children in this country, while leading global efforts to promote education and empower underserved communities as well as disabled populations.
Albert Lee Daniel: former Marine and father of three perseveres to earn degree after stroke
MAJOR: Political science
COLLEGE: Sixth College
When Albert Lee Daniel took a math assessment test at a local community college five years ago, he had flashbacks to the time he received an “F” in algebra during the seventh grade. This incident followed him through to his high school graduation in 1983, when Daniel decided to enlist in the United States Marine Corps, just nine days after his 17th birthday. After the military, he began working in the hospitality industry, which launched his career in accounting.
“For the next 30 plus years, I wore my lack of education as a badge of honor,” he said “I reveled in being an auto didactic learner and I was inquisitive and a voracious reader. I used to say, ‘I know a little bit about a lot of things.’ Now, while that might help me win at ‘Jeopardy,’ as I grew older, I knew I would hit the glass ceiling of not possessing a college degree.”
After two of his daughters graduated from college, Daniel enrolled at MiraCosta College in 2014, eager to start pursuing his education again. He was able to obtain an associate’s degree in 2017 and transfer to UC San Diego. “One of the happiest days of my life was receiving the acceptance email from UC San Diego,” said Daniel.
However, in spring 2018, Daniel suffered an arteriovenous malformation (AVM), a mass of veins and arteries that had grown together in his brain and then burst, which led to his withdrawal from school. “Fast forward six weeks and I had an angioplasty and neurosurgery to remove the AVM,” he said. “I suffered a stroke while in ICU and lost vision in my left eye…I dropped my spring classes while lying in a hospital bed, but I never wanted to give up on my education.”
Daniel was able to make up the classes he dropped by enrolling in summer session. He took the bus and trolley to and from his mother-in-law’s house in order to attend classes. This past fall, while still recuperating from his surgery, he was able to enroll in four classes and live on campus, with the help from the Office for Students with Disabilities and Housing, Dining and Hospitality.
After graduation, Daniel hopes to use his political science and public law degree to work either in non-profit or admissions and recruitment at the university or community college level. “I have the benefit of having lived quite a long time before my brain injury; however, it could have happened to me many years ago,” he said. “I have already done many things you hope to do – marry, have children, have a career, buy a house. The earning of this degree does not complete my life but complements it, and I hope to represent UC San Diego in a positive light wherever life takes me.”
Buddy Sampson: journalist takes nontraditional path to education to inspire others to achieve their dreams
MAJOR: Communications
COLLEGE: Thurgood Marshall College
Most incoming freshmen do not have a resume as impressive as Buddy Sampson. But then again, Sampson is no ordinary student. A seasoned journalist, editor and musician from Philadelphia, he took the non-traditional path to higher education and eventually ended up at UC San Diego, studying communications.
“UC San Diego has a great communications program,” he said. “I also wanted to show older people, of all races and ethnicities, that it’s never too late to achieve your dream of getting a degree.”
Before arriving at UC San Diego, Sampson worked as a journalist starting in 1989 and covered a variety of major events such as the OJ Simpson trial, the Los Angeles Riots and presidential elections. “It’s hard for me to pick one favorite memory from my career,” he said. “I’ve interviewed people like Bill Clinton, Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise, but my favorite interview has to be with my friend Johnny Sherman, who raised children as a single black dad, countering the negative stereotype of the deadbeat, black dad.”
From 2002-08, he produced a critically acclaimed television show, “People You Should Know,” where he would perform with and interview entertainment and music stars. As a musician, Sampson has played with several Philadelphia and Los Angeles music stars and generated a reputation as an energetic performer. He still produces and performs charity shows.
As an older student, Sampson loved being a part of UC San Diego’s graduate housing and enjoyed the beautiful beaches and surrounding area of La Jolla. He managed to juggle being a full-time student as well as working as the editor-in-chief and publisher of The Scoop LA, a newspaper targeted toward African-American readers that was founded in 1967.
“It was very challenging,” he said about supervising The Scoop LA with a full course load. “The publishing industry has changed a lot and being at UC San Diego has given me some new ideas to bring back to my work.” During his time at UC San Diego, Sampson has been a member of the National Society of Leadership and Success, worked as a community service officer and is an active member of the executive committee at Thurgood Marshall College.
For his honors thesis, Sampson drew on his experiences as an older African-American student on campus. “Being a non-traditional student is how true change happens in the world, so I hope to inspire other, non-traditional students to think that anything is possible,” he said. “I want to say to students that they are the light of the world, that they can change the world paradigm and not to listen to people that say, ‘you don’t matter’ or ‘they don’t matter.’ You do matter, and each of us are capable of making change in the world.”
Xiangdi Zhang: bridging cultural and international gaps through dance
MAJOR: International Studies – business and political science
COLLEGE: Sixth College
When Xiangdi Zhang was 15, she moved from Beijing to Connecticut by herself to start high school in America. The move was something her parents wanted so that she would receive a better education. Despite the language and cultural barrier that existed between herself and her new environment, she joined her high school dance team and gained a new sense of belonging. “Since then, dance has been a language and a way of communication for me to understand social problems around the world,” said Zhang.
At UC San Diego, she became involved with Movement Exchange, a nonprofit organization that aims to unite dance and service and ensure that dance education is accessible to all. Starting as a volunteer, Zhang was exposed to a different side of dance and a completely new audience. She began to lead dance workshops at foster care centers and special needs schools, using dance as a way to address behavioral issues with kids who had adverse childhood experiences. Through Zhang’s positive experiences with these social programs, she started applying for grants to test the importance of dance education and how it can address the need in social care of trauma-informed behavioral therapy.
Last fall, she was inspired to start Dance by the Border, a monthly dance exchange bringing students from UC San Diego to Tijuana, Mexico to learn about the border and its surrounding issues with a non-political approach.
“I had already gone on two international service dance exchanges with Movement Exchange where I taught at local orphanages in Panama,” said Zhang. “I loved the dance exchange because it’s not just your regular international border voluntourism trip. It’s a holistic view of the community and what they’re facing, and I wanted to take that model and apply it to the pressing issue of the U.S.-Mexico border.”
Leading by example, Zhang began to cross the border on a weekly basis in an effort to build up a local presence of the program and establish relationships with Mexican shelters and humanitarian organizations. “I convinced local shop owners to put up our program flyers in their stores,” she said. “With the help of Border Angels, a migrant rights advocacy group, a local yoga master agreed to let us organize a dance class after his yoga class and opened his home for our participants to spend the night in our two-day exchange program.”
Zhang is currently participating in the UC Washington Center (UCDC) program and interning with Congressman Salud Carbajal (D-24). After graduation, she hopes to continue her international work and start a venture group that will invest in transnational social innovations.
“The six years I’ve spent away from home has taught me the importance of community building,” said Zhang. “I want my venture group to empower those who are already doing great things in their community and also incentivize those who dive into the world of social innovation.”
Niranjanaa Jeeva and Julie Yip: social innovators working to reduce postpartum depression rates among low-income mothers
COLLEGE: Eleanor Roosevelt College; Earl Warren College
Niranjanaa Jeeva and Julie Yip, along with Ella Stimson, ’20, met at UC San Diego’s HealthHack in 2016, an annual interdisciplinary hackathon hosted by UC San Diego Health and UC San Diego’s Engineering World Health, an undergraduate student-led organization. There, they developed a startup called Hapty Hearts to support mothers through postpartum challenges.
“Through our research, we’ve discovered that perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs) can affect women in low-income families and households at almost double the rate,” said Jeeva. “That was something that was just unacceptable.” PMADs is a term that describes emotional conditions that may arise in women during pregnancy and after giving birth, most commonly manifesting itself in postpartum depression.
They developed a wearable device that would be available to low-cost to families most affected by PMADs. Using haptic feedback, also known as touch feedback, the devices connect mother and baby through heartbeat. The wearables are designed as a sock for the baby and blanket for the mother, and they help alleviate the symptoms of PMADs, which can include anxiety and depression. The rhythmic pulse generated from the sock is delivered via Bluetooth to the blanket a mother wraps around herself to feel intimately connected to her child even when not holding her baby.
“We weren’t inspired by a specific case of postpartum depression but when we started interviewing mothers to learn about their stories, we learned that all cases are unique and complex,” said Yip. “It was truly humbling to learn more about various cases, and even more so, to be educated on the more inclusive umbrella term of PMADs.”
Jeeva, Yip and Stimson took their idea to The Basement, one of UC San Diego’s many resources for student entrepreneurs. Through their affiliation with The Basement, they have had the opportunity to participate in events such as Converge Summer Incubator, the Ignite Conference, Triton Entrepreneur Night and the most recent Clinton Global Initiative University Conference. .
Yip graduated last winter and Jeeva is graduating this year, while Stimson is expected to graduate next spring. Yip has been working in public health research at the Center of Gender Equity and Health on intimate partner violence and transmission of sexually transmitted diseases, specifically HIV/AIDS and congenital syphilis. After graduation, she hopes to find research and development engineering positions and potentially work as a designer, engineer and entrepreneur in the global women’s health field. Jeeva will be attending Johns Hopkins University to pursue a master’s degree at the Center for Bioengineering Innovation and Design.
Savitri Arvey: research makes headlines on growing humanitarian crisis along U.S.-Mexican boarder
Major: Master’s of Public Policy candidate, School of Global Policy and Strategy
UC San Diego lies less than 30 miles north of the San Ysidro Port of Entry. In the last year, the ever-changing border has seen an exponential increase in the number of asylum-seekers, including many families, trying to flee violence and poverty in their homelands. The humanitarian crisis has been at the center of Savitri Arvey’s trail-blazing research.
The graduate student at UC San Diego’s School of Global Policy and Strategy (GPS) and researcher at the school’s Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies led an effort to conduct the most comprehensive analysis of asylum seekers waiting to enter the U.S., and the wait list structures. “I decided to study the current administration’s changes in asylum processing policies because I saw differences in how they were being rolled out across the border and the devastating impact on asylum seekers,” said Arvey.
Arvey and collaborators compiled fieldwork carried out in 13 cities along the U.S.-Mexico border, drawing upon interviews with government officials, representatives from civil society organizations and journalists.
The latest report Arvey contributed to revealed that the number of asylum seekers along the U.S.-Mexican border is close to 19,000, just days after the Associated Press estimated the number at 13,000. “Our latest report shows that the situation in border cities is getting worse over time,” said Arvey, who will earn a master in public policy this spring. “We found that migrant shelters across the entire border are over capacity. This has left thousands of asylum seekers to rent hotel rooms or even sleep on the streets, increasing their vulnerability for predation by organized crime or other opportunistic actors.” Arvey’s work has been cited by Vice Media, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the San Diego Union-Tribune as well as many international news outlets and the Mexican government.
“I’ve spent the last seven years focusing on U.S.-Mexico relations – first educational exchange and now migration – because I believe that a better understanding of our shared history and culture can translate into more effective policy on both sides of the border,” she added.
Her dedication to Latin American studies has been prevalent throughout her academic career. As a student, she received the Ryoichi Sasakawa Young Leaders Sylff fellowship as well as the Joseph Grunwald Award for Significant Contribution in the Promotion of Inter-American Understanding along with other awards and grants.
She also volunteers at the San Diego Rapid Response Network Migrant Shelter, and serves as managing director for the Journal of International Policy Solutions (JIPS) and Director for the External Affairs for Latin American Students Organization (LASO) at GPS.
After graduation, Arvey will continue to conduct research on U.S.-Mexico border policies and Mexico’s migratory
Gulnoza Said* is Program Coordinator, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Europe and Central Asia
Kyrgyzstan journalist Azimjon Askarov and his wife, Khadicha, pictured during a family vacation in Arslanbob in the summer of 2009. ‘This was Azimjon’s last summer of freedom,’ Khadicha told CPJ. (Askarov family)
NEW YORK, Jun 10 2019 (IPS) – On a recent morning in Bazar-Korgon, southern Kyrgyzstan, Khadicha Askarova was giving hasty instructions to her daughter about what needed to be packed.
They were about to set off: first for the capital Bishkek, some 600km from where they live, and then another 70km to a prison colony where her husband, Azimjon Askarov, was transferred in March.
But Askarov, a 68-year-old independent journalist and rights activist, shouldn’t be in jail at all. The U.N. Human Rights Committee ruled in 2016 that Askarov was subject to torture and mistreatment from the moment of his detention on June 15, 2010 to his speedy trial and subsequent imprisonment, and that he should be released immediately.
CPJ’s research into his case found that the original trial was marred by irregularities and allegations of torture, mistreatment and harassment of defendants, including Askarov, and their witnesses. But Kyrgyz authorities defied the U.N. resolution and in 2017, amid international outcry, upheld his life sentence.
Conditions in the new prison are harsh. In letters home, the journalist wrote that he had run ins with the guards and that prison officials punish detainees after visiting days. His health is also deteriorating and he has limited access to medication, the journalist’s wife, Askarova, said.
“What breaks my heart is to see how much he aged since being imprisoned. He used to be a man full of energy and vigor. Now, he is old, sickly, skinny, and there’s no way out of this situation for him,” she said, fighting back the tears when we spoke via a video messaging app earlier this month.
The couple, who have been married for over 40 years, now have limited contact: just six family visits and two phone calls a year. As Askarov wrote in a recent letter to his wife, “They like keeping us under a tight lid here. Communication with the outside world is banned.”
The letter, which his wife shared with CPJ, also gave a glimpse of the harsh prison conditions: “After family visits, inmates are punished by being forced to eat raw onions and carrots for several days.”
“On regular days, they give us pea soup that contains nothing but watery peas. On public holidays, we get what the prison administration calls plov [pilaf] but it is not more than 150g of rice cooked with some carrots, per person.”
Since Askarov’s transfer to a prison outside Bishkek in March, he wrote that he has had three “incidents” with prison guards. The journalist did not specify the nature of incidents, but wrote that guards were known for their mistreatment of and conflicts with inmates.
“There are few good ones among them”, he added, almost as if he was preventing possible punishment should the content of the letter became known to the guards.
One of the incidents was connected to the journalist’s poor health. He has the heart condition tachycardia, hypotension, and gets dizzy and nauseated if he stands for too long.
Under prison rules, if a guard enters a cell, the inmate must stand. “That’s the rule. Twice a day, guards enter cells. An inmate has to cite his full name and an article of the criminal code he was convicted of violating. But Azimjon was not able to stand straight for too long. His knees bend, he had to sit down. That was the ‘incident’,” the journalist’s wife, Askarova, told me.
Soon after the transfer, Askarov complained about his health to prison administration, and said that low blood pressure and a cold was diagnosed. “But they did not have any medication to give me,” he wrote.
Askarova told CPJ that doctors at the prison ask families to bring medication. “They rely on us for something that they ought to provide,” she said.
She added that the few visits they are allowed are emotional, and the travel hard and costly. She makes sure that one visit falls on her husband’s birthday, May 17. This year, the couple’s daughter and their three grandchildren also visited on his birthday, their first visit to a new jail.
‘I’m afraid they will forget how he looks’ Askarov’s wife says
Azimjon Askarov, pictured with his daughter Navruza and grandchildren, during a May 2018 visit in Bishek prison. The journalist was moved to a new prison in 2019 that bans families from taking photographs during visits. (Askarova family)
“The new prison is much farther from Bishkek. After a nearly 14-hour drive to Bishkek, we took another taxi to the prison, but then had to walk about seven kilometers in the heat and dust. It was especially hard for the little ones, although they were excited to see their grandfather. They are still little, and I am afraid they can forget how he looks like, how he sounds,” Askarova said.
Adding to that concern is a rule at the prison banning families from taking photographs during visits. “Now, I have to look at old pictures of Azimjon. They deprived me even of the photos of my husband,” she said.
Askarova said she would move to Bishkek to be closer to the prison, but she cannot sell the house that her husband has owned for decades. The authorities seized the journalist’s property after he was charged in 2010.
In 2015, the journalist’s lawyer successfully appealed against the seizure, but before Askarova had overcome a legal quagmire of changing the ownership, authorities placed a new lien on the house in February. She said she has started another appeal process.
Askarova said that before they visit each year on his birthday, the couple’s daughter Navruza, who lives in Uzbekistan, usually comes to Bazar-Korgon to help pack personal items, food, medicine and books. But it is Askarova who picks flowers from her garden and buys bouquets at a florist for her husband.
“He is an artist, you know. He loves flowers. I get the most beautiful ones for him. Many kinds, sometimes several bouquets,” she said.
Azimjon and Khadicha met at art college in the Uzbek capital Tashkent in 1974. They have been married for 42 years and raised four children, who live in Uzbekistan. He used to work as an artist. But every time he heard a neighbor complain of injustice, he felt the urge to help, Askarova said.
In the late 1990s, he started documenting the cases, mediating between his community members and law enforcement, and researching legal books. He eventually became a go-to person in Bazar-Korgon if the rights of a member of his community had been violated.
He was known for taking up the cases on police brutality. It was this reputation that led many people to come to him for help when violence against ethnic Uzbeks erupted in June 2010, she said.
In prison, Askarov started to paint again. In 2014, international and local activists organized an exhibition of Askarov’s work to raise awareness of his case. In 2018, he wrote a book, “I am happy,” which includes a dedication to his late mother, “who lost me, her son, during her and my life, and left this world, shocked by the greatest injustice.” Copies of the book are still available online.
During his imprisonment, Askarov studied English and is able to read the many cards sent to him from around the world, his wife said. She added that he has been studying Japanese from the books and dictionaries she brought him, and that he has become interested in herbal medicine because conventional medication was not available in prison.
Askarov has also kept a diary since 2010. “He writes down everything. I keep reading them in between prison visits. One word that he uses most frequently is freedom. When he sees rain through the cell window, he writes ‘I wish I was free to feel rain drops on my skin. When he sees snow, he writes ‘I wish I was free to be outside and enjoy the snow now’. Freedom is his main wish and goal. He lives for it,” Askarova said.
* Gulnoza Said is a journalist and communications professional with over 15 years of experience in New York, Prague, Bratislava, and Tashkent. She has covered issues including politics, media, religion, and human rights with a focus on Central Asia, Russia, and Turkey.
