Student tackles human trafficking

Michael Miller

For most students, a Fulbright scholarship is a chance to travel

abroad for the first time. For Tatyana Martell, it’s more like a

homecoming.

Last summer, the Armenian-born UC Irvine student interned at the

U.S. Embassy in Lithuania, the country where she spent much of her

childhood. While working for the State Department, Martell read

reports about one of the worst crises facing the former Soviet Union:

human trafficking. Hearing accounts of young women being bartered and

sold in the economically depressed countries, Martell vowed to

dedicate the next phase of her life to researching -- and, possibly,

fighting -- the illicit trade.

“It’s a dreadful problem, and it’s so little-talked about,” said

Martell, 30. “It affects the U.S., and it affects nearly every other

country in the world.”

Martell has an ally in her journey. This fall, the undergraduate

will travel on a Fulbright community service grant to study human

trafficking at Yaroslavl State University in Russia. In addition, she

will use part of her scholarship money to work with women and teenage

girls who are potential targets of the trade.

“A lot of the time, women think they’re going to work as nannies

or dishwashers,” Martell said. “Then, as soon as they cross the

border, their papers are taken away. They’re often beaten and abused,

or forced into sex work.”

Studying at Yaroslavl and visiting women’s shelters, Martell may

pull a number of long, lonely hours. On Monday, however, she sat

among friends as one of 16 students honored at UCI’s annual National

Awards Recognition Luncheon.

Packing the small dining room in the back of the campus University

Club were three Fulbright scholars, three Barry M. Goldwater scholars

and several candidates and winners of other awards. UCI tied its

single-year records for number of Fulbright and Goldwater winners in

2005.

“There is a palpable feeling of hope in this room,” scholarship

counselor Rebecca Harris told the crowd. “It’s wonderful to be a part

of.”

Audrey DeVore, founder of the campus Scholarship Opportunities

program, presented certificates to each of the 16 honorees present.

She noted that at least 70 UCI students had applied for scholarships

in 2004-05.

“It takes courage to apply for these awards,” DeVore said. “You

know the odds. You may do everything right and still not get it.”

Since 1990, when UCI began the Scholarship Opportunities program,

nearly 100 students have won state and national honors, including 23

Goldwater scholars, 20 Fulbright fellows and five Truman scholars.

This year, recipients’ destinations ranged from Costa Mesa to France

and Austria.

Apart from Martell, the other Fulbright winners were Catherine

Nguyen, who plans to study Vietnamese literature at the University of

Provence, and David Hallowell, who got a grant to study psychology at

the University of Vienna. Hallowell will work under the tutelage of

Alfried Langle, a protege of existentialism pioneer Viktor Frankl.

Goldwater scholarships, which fund undergraduate work at UCI, went

to information and computer science major Arthur Asuncion Jr.,

mechanical engineering major Danielle Issa and biological science and

dance major Vicky Zhou. The second annual Merage American Dream

Fellowship went to political science major Mayte Santacruz Benavidez,

who will study law at UC Berkeley in the fall.

Biochemistry and molecular biology major Vivek Mehta won the

Donald A. Strauss Scholarship to develop a series of health seminars

at the Share Our Selves medical clinic in Costa Mesa.

Also honored at the luncheon were Brittany Schick, UCI’s first

George J. Mitchell scholar, Rotary scholars Gregoria Baranzadeh and

Mukul Kumar, Morris K. Udall honorable mention Sara Huber, Fulbright

candidates Theresa Nguyen and Kara Tanaka, National Science

Foundation honorable mention Sukant Mittal, and Jacqueline

Chattopadhyay, one of Glamour magazine’s Top Ten College Women this

year.