Read the press release about the 2007 recipients.

Mona Dalal

Second-year student, Carver College of Medicine
Love and Mercy Coalition
Tanzania

The limited access to primary health care impacted Mona Dalal when she aided staff at a rural hospital in Itigi, Tanzania. Through the Love and Mercy Coalition, Dalal was able to help care for impoverished children. In Itigi, where she spent the first part of the summer, "most of the patients have never seen a doctor before.” Due to limited clean water, lack of education, and large family sizes, malnutrition and infection are common. Dalal also spent time in the capital, Dar es Salaam, where she shadowed doctors and witnessed life-changing surgeries. “I think that health care is a human right,” she said.

Katie Jo Sloter

Undergraduate, psychology and international studies
George Foundation
India

Katie Jo Sloter traveled to the state of Tamil Nadu in India to work with the George Foundation. She spent time in a rural healthcare clinic, taught an English class for seventh graders at the foundation’s school, and visited surrounding villages to conduct surveys and give seminars about public health concerns. Through teaching, Sloter believes she helped individual community members and gained understanding of medicine-related social issues that require prevention. Sloter is especially concerned about domestic abuse: “I really have a passion for making people feel safe,” she said. Sloter will join the Peace Corps in February 2010 and focus on health promotion. Afterward she plans to pursue a Masters of Public Health. She calls the Cmiel Funded Internship “a huge step in pursuing my dreams for my own personal career and my dreams for what the world could be like.”

Wesley Carrington

Second-year student, College of Law
Ministry of Human Rights
Buenos Aires, Argentina

During an eight-week internship in Argentina, Wesley Carrington researched proposed municipal legislation and determined how fundamental human rights might be implicated. As an intern with the Sub-secretariat of Human Rights for the city of Buenos Aires, he used his Spanish skills and prior knowledge of the country to “research issues at the intersection of law and human rights.” In addition to research, Carrington was allowed to sit in on consultations with Argentinians seeking help from the office – from homeless men looking for shelter to “a military cook from the 1980s who talked about detention plans he had overheard from superior officers” during the country’s Dirty War.

Amanda Furst

Third-year student, College of Law
The Advocacy Center
New Orleans, LA

Amanda Furst spent her summer providing a myriad of free legal services through an internship with the Advocacy Center in New Orleans. She worked with individuals still trying to rebuild their lives after Hurricane Katrina. “Everyone I worked with already had been through 30 agencies, but none worked out,” Furst said. “It’s not about rebuilding the city--it's about the 200,000 [people] who don’t have homes and can’t feed their kids.” In October 2008, Furst was admitted to the Louisiana bar and began work as an Equal Justice Works/AmeriCorps Legal Fellow at New Orleans Legal Assistance (NOLAC). As a fellow, she manages legal volunteers and works as a practicing attorney.

Bogdan Ciochinaru

Undergraduate, political science and international studies
Asociatia Pro Democratia
Romania

Bogdan Ciochinaru interned at the Pro Democracy Association and Freedom House Foundation in Romania. He coordinated a workshop for social activists, contributed to projects helping inmates, researched European civic education, and participated in The Initiative for Clean Justice – a movement toward judicial reform and anti-corruption
measures in the country. He enjoyed working with other young people dedicated to improving their country. “I learned a lot, about how to actually make an impact ... and it renewed faith in the power of young people to make changes,” Ciochinaru said.

Suzie Pritchett

Third-year student, College of Law
Africa Division, Human Rights Watch
New York City

Interviewing human rights researchers and practitioners in the field was routine for Suzan Pritchett during her internship at the world headquarters of Human Rights Watch in New York City. The third-year College of Law student undertook a research project focusing on the newly emerging African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. She examined how the Court can bring justice to African women who have suffered from human rights violations that fall under the Court’s jurisdiction. Pritchett says the Cmiel Internship fostered her interest in human rights and international law, which led to a position as judicial law clerk in the United States Immigration Court in Memphis, TN. In October 2009, Pritchett moved to New York to serve as an immigration staff attorney for the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Her work involves reviewing petitions of lower court findings on applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture.

Mingzhao Xu

Second-year student, College of Law
Housing and Community Development Program, Asian Law Caucus
San Francisco

Mingzhao Xu spent the summer with the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco. As part of the Housing/Community Development team, she researched and wrote memos on housing/civil rights issues, prepared for eviction defense litigation, organized tenant workshops and translated for Cantonese/Mandarin clients. She also helped organize grassroots tenant groups and clinics. Xu added, “I learned the most from the people I worked with because there [are]certain things that you cannot learn in law school ... [for example] how to explain complex legal ideas to limited-English speakers with little education.”

Mary White

Ph.D. candidate, UI College of Public Health
World Health Organization
Geneva, Switzerland

Health communication and information technology were the primary forces driving Mary White during her internship at the World Health Organization’s international headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. White spent the summer working on two projects that aim to make information accessible in places where internet access is limited. “Information, education, and being able to support oneself is a human right,” said White. The eGranary and Global Health Campus, which are sponsored by UI and utilized by the WHO, use technology to provide digital libraries and conferencing capabilities to medical and community workers worldwide.

Londa Vanderwal

Ph.D. candidate, UI College of Public Health
Gambia College
The Gambia

Londa Vanderwal, a Ph.D. candidate in Occupational and Environmental Health, spent the summer researching the health and safety of agricultural workers in The Gambia. Through an internship with The Gambia College, Vanderwal applied her knowledge of the discipline to a practical setting. In addition to introducing workers to new farming tools, Vanderwal helped develop a course in agricultural health and safety and helped create policies enforcing workers’ rights in the country. “Occupational health and safety is not practiced much in Africa,” said Vanderwal. “I was trying to make work less difficult as well as improve their health and safety.” Looking back, Vanderwal says the Cmiel Internship made her realize she could do much to improve the human rights condition of women farmers in the Gambia through research. She returned to the Gambia to do research for her Ph.D., which she completed in June 2009. Recently Vanderwal has worked for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in the Gambia on a food safety project.