The Tufts Daily
12
Features
Commencement 2012
Spotlight on the Class Marian Swain
Doreen Ndishabandi
Allister Chang
jodi bosin / the tufts daily
kristen collins / the tufts daily
Sitting across from Allister Chang, a well-spoken young man with a friendly smile, it’s hard to believe he once planned on being an athlete instead of a college graduate. “As a kid, when I blew out my birthday candles, ever since I was six years old I would wish to go to the Olympics,” Chang said. Until he was 16, Chang worked hard to realize this dream, passing all U.S. Figure Skating Association tests, competing at the U.S. Junior Championships and even performing at Madison Square Garden. But then he got an infection in his leg that threatened not only his skating career but the leg itself. “I started to realize that if I hurt myself, I wouldn’t have anything,” he said. “That’s when I started looking at colleges.” Although he no longer skates competitively, the mindset he honed will stay with him forever. “Skating is the way that I see the world; you prepare for a year for two-and-a-half minutes to prove yourself — the two-and-a-half-minute program as a whole is exhausting,” he said. “If you take it in pieces, though, one jump and one spin at a time, it’s a lot less daunting.” Judging by his accomplishments so far, this worldview has been successful for Chang, this year’s Wendell B. Phillips Commencement speaker. He served as the treasurer of the Tufts Mountain Club and the Tufts Elections Commission, and as an assistant at the Office of the Vice Provost. Perhaps most poignant to Chang was his role as the co-president of the Tufts Queer Straight Alliance (QSA). “I had never come out in high school, and I came out to my Wilderness group for the first time,” Chang said. “I walked back and forth in front of the LGBT Center for about 10 minutes, until I finally walked inside. My sophomore year I was the president of QSA.” Chang’s dedication to changing the world is evident in his future plans, as he plans on going into public policy. Recently accepted into the Harvard Kennedy School, he interned in the Massachusetts State House and the New York Civil Liberties Union. He worked in Paris for an NGO in the summer of 2010 and with the Taiwanese government in 2011. He plans to go back to Taiwan for a year after graduation to care for his aging grandmother, but his fast-paced career will hardly slow. “I’m deferring for a year for personal reasons,” Chang said. “I knew beforehand that this was a possibility, so I also applied for a grant from the Taiwanese government, and they’ve provided me with a scholarship to study at NTU [National Taiwan University].” In the long term, Chang plans on making a serious impact on the world through policy, focusing on LGBT issues. “Would anyone understand what I’m trying to say if I said that I want to be the first gay, Asian, Chineseimmigrant President?” Chang said, smiling wryly. “I want to aim high, but I recognize that there are constraints on what I can do in public policy because of who I am, and that’s what I want to get rid of. Those are the chains that I want to get rid of. Those are the chains that are holding down our meritocracy.”
Being from Massachusetts, Marian Swain was unsure whether she wanted to attend college close to home. “My mom was the one who encouraged me to visit Tufts,” Swain said. After a promising tour, she applied and decided to attend Tufts — a decision she does not regret. “I’ve had a lot of great opportunities here,” she said. Among those opportunities was the chance to be the managing director of Tufts Burlesque Troupe, the Hill’s second-largest dance group. However, when Swain started with the troupe during her second semester at Tufts, it was much more quaint. “It was still the founders of Burlesque who were running it,” Marian said. “It was just this group of girls from different dance backgrounds who wanted to do something at Tufts that they felt wasn’t represented by the dance groups that already existed.” Seeing the troupe become more popular has been exciting for Swain. “It’s been fun to see this group grow and go in different directions,” she said. When not sweating in Jackson Gym’s dance studios, Swain dedicated herself to her studies in international relations (IR) and German. She explained that her German studies have influenced her IR concentration in environmental economics. “Germany is very progressive on environmental and energy policy. Even in German language classes they talk about environmental issues because that’s so important in the German political climate,” Swain said about the connection between her two areas of study. Her decision to study abroad also was influenced by her linguistic pursuits. “The German department encourages students to study abroad through Tufts-in-Tn because it is such a great program,” she said. “Going to Tubingen for a year was the best decision I made at Tufts.” Initially, Swain was apprehensive about studying abroad in a small town. However, that fear faded when she discovered the unique opportunities Tubingen presented. “Tubingen is small and it’s almost all students,” Swain said. “You’re more likely to see people you know when walking around, rather than in a bigger city where you might feel a little more isolated.” Consequently, being in Tubingen allowed her to develop stronger relationships with her German peers. After returning from Germany, Swain continued her endeavors in environmental policy and German affairs through an internship with the German Consulate General in Boston. One of the more exciting opportunities through her internship has been the chance to work with one of the consulate’s programs, the Transatlantic Climate Bridge. “It focuses on exchanging the best information on policy and projects between people in Germany and the Boston area,” she said, explaining that it was very informative for her given her concentration in environmental economics. Despite spending only a year back in the States, Swain will be returning to Germany through connections she made from her internship. “I’ve been offered a six-month paid internship with a sustainable energy and environmental consulting firms called IFOK in Berlin,” Swain said. “As long as I get my visa sorted out, I will be there in September.”
Not many seniors can say they’ve interned at the Rwandan Supreme Court or plan to return to Africa for the indefinite future. Doreen Ndishabandi can, and she has done much more throughout her four years at Tufts. Ndishabandi, who is originally from Uganda, has a strong interest in Africa and the many issues related to the continent. She majored in international relations with a concentration in Africa, and has been actively involved in the Tufts Collaborative on Africa as well as Tufts Against Genocide. Ndishabandi also volunteered for a Bostonbased nonprofit called Youth Action Africa, which promotes educational initiatives in an effort to encourage technological advances that will reduce African poverty and poor health conditions. “I was pretty much designing an intercollegiate debate series that focused specifically on Africa and issues pertaining to the African continent,” she said. “That required me to woo people from different organizations and different schools.” During her junior year, Ndishabandi studied abroad in Rwanda and Uganda. The Inspector General of the Rwandan Supreme Court served as the adviser for her work-study project, where she worked with government institutions and genocide perpetrators. He offered her the internship, and she decided to take him up on his offer the following summer. Ndishabandi attended the weeklong Tufts service program at the Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village in Rwanda. “I was a bit skeptical about going on the trip because I’m generally very skeptical about shortterm volunteer projects. I always fear that it turns into a form of tourism,” she said. “But it turned out to be a really amazing experience, and I think I connected really strongly with some of the students at the village, who I’m still in communication with.” After the trip ended, Ndishabandi stayed in Rwanda for her internship at the inspectorate general of the Supreme Court, whose role is to examine the other bodies of the court and report on them to the President of the Supreme Court. “I was their research intern, so I researched comparative case studies, then came up with recommendations for their new strategic plans,” she said. “Then I worked with the legal advisors, drafting reports.” The internship has broadened Ndishabandi’s options for the future. She is unsure about whether she wants to attend law school, but is sure that she plans on returning to live permanently in Rwanda or another country in Africa. “I’m originally from Uganda, but I want to see if I can live in a country where I don’t really have any friends, or anyone close to me, and live comfortably alone as a female,” she said. “So I was test-driving that experience. And it turned out to be amazing.” After graduation, Ndishabandi will return to Rwanda in to work with a foundation called WE-ACTx. WE-ACTx works with Rwandan youth and women living with HIV and AIDS to increase their access to healthcare. After that, her possibilities include a long-term position at the AgahozoShalom Youth Village, or the Peace Corps. Although the future remains uncertain, one thing will always be certain for Ndishabandi — her desire to return to the African continent. “Right from the beginning, I was sure I wanted to go back,” she said “I never had any doubts about that.”
—by Amelia Quinn
—by Jacob Passy
—by Lily Sieradzki
jodi bosin / the tufts daily