View all graduates

Her impact is felt in New Jersey and abroad

By Ashanti M. Alvarez

Douglass College graduating senior Dewan Farhana was riding a Rutgers bus in New Brunswick when she read a newspaper story about Darfur, Sudan, where a group of armed gunmen known as the Janjaweed are largely blamed for the genocide taking place in that country.

“The Janjaweed went into a home, shot the father, and they raped the daughter for 10 days straight,” Farhana said. “It was one of the most horrible things I have ever read.”

Farhana’s commitment to women’s issues, nurtured at Douglass College through her leadership and involvement on campus, spurred her to create the Darfur Action Project in order to raise awareness among students of the calamities taking place in Sudan. “Women are being oppressed in that region. It is important that women get involved, not just in general, but also to understand things on a personal level and make a difference,” she said.

The organization hosted a well-attended lecture in March featuring a Sudanese refugee who addressed the United Nations about the genocide in 1999, and its coordinators have collected thousands of signatures on a petition to the United Nations, stating that Rutgers students do not accept genocide.

“When I started thinking about this project, some students didn’t even know what the word genocide meant,” said Farhana, a native of Paterson, New Jersey. “I thought that even if I can’t do something really big, the least I can do is make more students aware.”

The formation of the Darfur Action Project was the culmination of Farhana’s successful career as a Rutgers student. Rutgers College recognized Farhana’s achievements by naming her “Outstanding Student Leader” as part of the annual Rising Women of Rutgers Awards, and Douglass College awarded her the “Outstanding Individual Contribution” award at the Mabel’s Leadership Recognition Awards.

She was a resident assistant, a Scarlet Ambassador, president of the Cook/Douglass Co-op executive board, and a writing tutor. As a cell biology and neuroscience major, Farhana also pursued several research opportunities, at the W.M. Keck Center with Professor Wise Young, at the Center for Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience at Rutgers–Newark, and at Yale University during a summer fellowship.

“I went to different meetings to figure out what I may be interested in,” Farhana said. “Rutgers was a great place for someone like me who was very involved in high school.”

The social network she acquired and became a part of helped the Darfur Action Project to flourish while Farhana was a student at Rutgers. Now that she has moved on – she is looking forward to pursuing a joint M.D./Ph.D. – Farhana plans to spend one year doing intensive research in the Molecular Neurogenetics lab at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), then apply to medical schools.

What is the connection between Farhana’s global activism and life in the lab as a molecular biologist or wearing a physician’s coat? “The crisis in Darfur is a humanitarian cause,” she said. “If you are interested in being a researcher, you want to influence the world by finding cures that will help people. After being involved with so many different things, I realize that everything is interconnected.”

Farhana connected with many student groups in order to publicize the action project, most notably Women Empowered, the student organization for the Douglass College Equal Opportunity Fund Program. The group regularly arranges activities relating to female empowerment and involvement in politics and public policy.

MTVU recognized the promise of the Darfur Action Project – and Farhana learned a lot about the grant writing process – when it awarded the project a $1,000 grant. Farhana will leave the program’s organization in the hands of some of her residence life student-colleagues, but hopes to maintain involvement in the group and perhaps volunteer in Sudan, if it’s ever possible.

“That’s a very far-sighted idea, but that is the latest idea,” she said. “They don’t even accept any food donations. The only thing you can donate is money. It’s just not possible to send in aircraft and airplanes right now.”

Project organizers are hoping to raise the groups profile next year, perhaps with a large-scale fundraiser or concert. At the same time, Farhana will work with the NIH and ponder whether to get her M.D., Ph.D., or M.P.H. (master in public health) – maybe all three.

“I eventually want to do something involving medicine and public policy,” Farhana said. “I have been pretty good at balancing a lot of things.”