Student Studies Social Work at the University of Minnesota Duluth

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Receiving support from the University of Minnesota Duluth is the reason Tamara Miskovic is attending the university at this time. “I am from Bosnia and Herzegovina actually from the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina name Sarajevo and I came to the United States two months ago starting my social work master’s program here. Then I had an interview with the Dean of UMD,” she says. “Actually, I came here because people from the University of Minnesota Duluth were willing to support me because for young people from Bosnia and Herzegovina it is very difficult to afford money and to come abroad to study. So I got support and that was the main reason for my decision to come and study at the University of Minnesota.”

As the twenty-seven year old works towards a master's degree in social work, Tamara says her interest in the field started back home after realizing that her peers as well as herself needed basic services after the war there. "Actually, I finish social work at the university in Sarajevo and that was after the war. I was a kid during the war so social work is a human science and it attracted me to start changing not only something for myself, but also for the community and my peers in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” she says.

“So after the war there was a huge rate of unemployment. No one guaranteed that they would find employment when they finish studying. Also, if I go back to my country with my master’s degree no one will guarantee that I will be able to find work. We can always work but voluntary. Also, these days there is post-traumatic syndrome with kids who are growing up divided between religions Catholic Bosnia’s is what we call them or orthodox so the country is divided. "I work there on integrating and reconciliation through different projects and activities to save those kids there,” she says.

“Also, people are in state of basic social needs or basic human needs. They need food. They need clothes and they need it now immediately and society has bigger problems and can't give support to kids so we have to do something for ourselves and care for ourselves so that is one of the reasons and how I decided and started with social work.”

Tamara says the university is a great place and she likes the diversity among students as well as the flexibility of the professors. “The first thing that I realize immediately when I came to the university was the differences and diversity among students and for me to be among those things was a huge and very big deal,” she says.

“I liked it so much and the other thing is the program and how it is created. How theory and practice are very integrated, but sometimes we lack in other countries so I got the opportunity immediately to implement everything that I studied. Also, flexibility and openness of professors is another thing that I like so much so I have to study hard, but that is something that I like and that gives me an opportunity to learn as much as possible.”

As an international student, Tamara says one thing she would like to achieve is meeting and becoming friends with American students. “This year I was thinking I was not culture shock, but again I had to go through the process and also I am alone here I don’t have any family," she says.

"Actually I have a host mother who helped me and with whom I live now, but international students are alone here when they don’t have their community then it is more difficult for them to deal with the culture shock,” she says.

“The question I am asking people around is how to make friends with American peers, with people from America who study with us. Sometimes what I see at the university is that there are multi-cultural clubs, but I am just afraid that it is only multi-cultural people that I see there. I would like more Americans to be involved with us and to be with us and I would like us to become friends.”

As for graduating from the University of Minnesota Duluth, Tamara says...”If everything is okay I should graduate in May 2009."

Rahul Keerthi Gets an Education and Much More at Brown University

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Twenty-three year old Rahul Keerthi attends Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. So what is it like there? Rahul says....” I say lively. I say active. I say challenging in the sense that it challenges the way I think because of all these thoughts I have around,” he says.

“It is also challenging in that it really pushes me, it is really frustrated me at times being here, but that is how I grow you know when you are challenged, when you are really pushed to your boundaries and you are really forced to sit down and question say ‘why am I doing this,’ or ‘what does this mean’ that is the kind of environment you want to be in and I just think that really what Brown is. It’s lively and it is such a warm place despite the weather here at times it is a very warm place,” he says. “I love about all things the people. The people that I have met here at Brown, they are just wonderful, wonderful people.”

The third year junior is majoring in Commerce, organizations and entrepreneurial ship (or COE), which is a relatively new track at Brown University. Rahul says his specific field is organizational behavior. Exactly what that entails, he tells us. “Organizational Behavior is interesting in that its kind of a business perspective, but because Brown is a liberal arts university and intends for all of its students all of us to have a very broad base understanding of all of our subjects, what COE does is that it gives us a view of organizations from all sort of perspectives,” he says. “

So I have taken courses not just in Sociology where I look at like groups in organizations or how managers and leaders run their organizations, but I have also taken courses in Engineering to understand how technology impacts companies or courses in Psychology and Economics to understand the basis of which firms make decisions and things like that,” he says. “So because of the nature of the university, COE is actually a unique program here and it is really enjoyable for me to take it because I don’t feel like I am being constrained to just one way of thinking about business.”

Rahul says hearing about Brown University and the open exchange of thoughts one can experience when receiving an education in the U.S., he says he looked forward to leaving home and coming here. “I was born in 1984 in Madras, India and I barely lived there actually, my family stayed there for about six months before we moved to Germany and then I lived there for about five years and then from there we moved on to Singapore where I lived ever since,” he says.

“So I was pretty much raised and brought up in Singapore. Educated there all my life and I am pretty much a Singaporean now and the reason why I came to the United States is actually I heard a lot about the universities here in the U-S and the nature of the curriculum and the nature of the education here that there is always an open exchange of ideas, or thoughts and that you have the best and the brightest minds that congregate here especially in the northeast where I am I have heard so many wonderful things about this place and I just had to experience it for myself,” he says. “So when the chance came up to apply to a university here I jumped at it.”

Attending Brown University has been very rewarding for Rahul and he says he is proud to be an international student on that campus. “I’m very proud that I bring an international perspective to the university. That I come here as an international student not just to take the education that the university provides, but also to give back and so I do feel like an international student and I do have that feeling because I am proud to be one and I want everyone to know that I am one,” he says. “That I come from Singapore and that I have grown up in these countries and I have experienced a few things and I can share it with them and I also want to learn where they are from and what they have to give to our society, to our community, to our university.”

Graduation is only two years away and Rahul wants to work in the consulting field. “I’m planning to graduate in two thousand and nine. I actually have no idea what I am going to do when in graduate, but I would love to start working for a company that really involves itself in business,” he says. “

So when I graduate I’m actually hoping to try my hand at consultancy because I feel like it is very interesting and a growing field. There’s so many different perspective that come out every year about how businesses should be run, how people should grow their businesses for the people who work for them and for the people that they serve and that is something that I want to commit and dedicate myself to.”