Report from Ecuador: Cathaleen Kaiyoorawongs '08
When her homework calls for research, a library is the last place Cathaleen Kaiyoorawongs '08 thinks to visit.
Instead Cathaleen, an environmental policy major, wakes at 5:30 a.m. to mist-net hummingbirds and toucanets in the rural communities of Intag, a region in Ecuador struggling to preserve its natural habitat. (A mist net is a very thin net that birds cannot see and therefore fly into; researchers then take the birds out of the net to take measurements and record data.)
This Sarasota, Florida native is studying in Quito, Ecuador this semester through the School for International Training's Comparative Ecology and Conservation Program. The hands-on curriculum means Cathaleen and her peers often travel to learn about local culture and ecology in the field, which includes the Amazon, a cloud forest reserve, the Páramo (the highland Andes), and the Galápagos Islands.
Cathaleen is completing academic coursework in ecology, conservation, ethnobotany, history, and politics. In addition to traveling throughout Ecuador, she's working to complete a month-long independent research project before heading back to New York City. The lessons she's collecting extend beyond the sciences. "People here are economically poor, but so incredibly rich in family and community that it is hard to call them poor," she says. "They are politically active and know much more about their environment than Americans generally do."
Traveling to other lands is a comfortable experience for Cathaleen. In her third year at Barnard, she traveled to the Dominican Republic for spring break to volunteer at a hospital and a community center. Her knowledge of Spanish enabled her to act as a translator for American students making supplies available to a rural community there. Cathaleen also accompanied doctors on their rounds to learn about the area's pressing medical problems, and talked to local high school students about safe sex practices and other health issues.
Before arriving in Quito in August, Cathaleen traveled to Costa Rica, Peru, and Argentina over a three-week period. In Intag, she experienced life on an organic farm, living with a host family. That was an outdoor adventure in sustainability, she says. "I bathed in waterfalls, used an outhouse, and showered in nature, surrounded by only trees." Beyond nature, she learned directly from the local people about economic and environmental struggles they faced—such as protecting themselves and their environment from the effects of mining and operations of petroleum companies.
Prior to her travels, and with the support of an internship grant from the Charlotte Zmora Fahn '59 and Stanley Fahn Internship Fund, Cathaleen worked at Childen's Hospital of New York-Presbyterian under Dr. Manuela Orjuela over the summer. She studied how nutrition influences the genetic development of retinoblastoma, cancer of the retina. Time was also devoted to her senior thesis on nutrition and metabolism, which focuses on her work with Dr. Mary Gamble at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health.
Once she returns to New York, Cathaleen hopes to pursue a different kind of internship experience—she plans to work in the Brooklyn District Attorney's office, in the sexual assault and domestic violence unit. Her interest stems from a desire to focus on social work or public health as a field of graduate study, so that she might someday help survivors of domestic and sexual assault.
At the heart of what drives her is a commitment to accountability. That has guided her journeys near and far. Says Cathaleen: "I value being a responsible citizen."
—Amy DeRobertis
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