WEBVTT

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Hello everybody.

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My name is Ariel Fry Demetria.

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I am a junior here at
Mount Holyoke College.

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And today I'll be talking to you
about my internship experience

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this summer.

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So I worked as a business
administration intern

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at the Daraja Academy
in Nanyuki, Kenya.

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And I know business and Ariel
don't really go hand in hand.

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So when I told my best friend
I wanted to major in economics,

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she rolled her eyes.

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So I worked at the
Daraja Academy.

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The Daraja Academy is a
residential high school

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for Kenyan girls
that don't have means

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of furthering their education.

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And Daraja really prides
itself in women's empowerment.

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Since in Kenya only 48%
of girls are enrolled

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in secondary education,
and 16% of women in Kenya

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are functionally
illiterate, girls education

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is really crucial.

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Furthermore, when Kenyan
families have only enough money

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to send one of their
children to high school

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or to further their education,
they usually send their son.

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So I really resonate well
with the Daraja mission.

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I got this internship
through a Mount Holyoke

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alum who works with my
mom at Charles Schwab.

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And she was a Latin
American studies major.

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And she now works finance.

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But I have a strong
relationship with her

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because she speaks Spanish.

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And I speak Spanish.

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And she referred
me to this program.

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And so I am eternally
grateful to her for that.

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So some of my
responsibilities and projects

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that I did during my
internship was research.

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I researched potential partner
organizations for the school.

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I also developed an online point
of sale for the campus store

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and put together the buying
prices, selling prices,

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and their margins.

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I also acted as a matron for
a week, which is like an RA,

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because the girls had their
midterm semester break.

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And so we did a
lot of fun things.

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I facilitated some sleepovers
in the dining hall.

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And the matron,
the actual matron,

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had to take a girl to
the hospital one night.

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So I watched her
two year old baby.

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And that was probably one of
the highlights of my experience

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there.

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And I also assisted
with WISH classes.

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So each week every form, which
are like grades, so 9th grade,

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10th grade, 11th grade, 12th
grade, attends WISH classes.

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And that stands for Women of
Integrity, Strength, and Hope.

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And these teach anything
from sex ed to they

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teach a lot of FGM,
which is Female Genital

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Mutilation, because that
is really common in Kenya.

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They also teach a lot
about childhood marriages

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and arranged marriages
since a lot of the girls

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are unable to fulfill their
education due to meeting boys

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to become married.

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And so I assisted
with some of those.

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I made diagrams of the
reproductive system, which

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was really fun, and taught
the girls some of that.

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So going into the
internship, I knew

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that I was going to learn
some useful techniques that

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were going to help me
in my economics career.

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And I did.

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I definitely learned Excel,
which is a great thing.

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We all need that.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I learned how to strengthen
my research skills.

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But what I really am going
to take away obviously

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is not the Excel,
not the research.

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Like similar to what Cat said,
I developed such strong bonds

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with these students.

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I actually just went home for
a weekend because two of them

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were doing a bunch of
presentations in California.

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So I went to assist
them with that

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and support them through that.

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And I think my
experience in Kenya,

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and the connections
I made is what

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I'm going to really take away.

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Furthermore, I also took
a class at the University

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of San Francisco's
School of Medicine.

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And it was called a pre-health
undergraduate program

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after I returned
home from Kenya.

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And that combined with
some of the things

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I witnessed in Kenya, like a
lot of 15 and 14 year old boys

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being so high off of glue
because they don't have access

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to food, and don't have access
to the medicine and the care

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that they need to support
their disabilities

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and any type of medical
problems they may have.

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That combined with a lot
of the girls at the school

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had really bad toothaches
because they don't have access

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to dental care.

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So that in combination
with what I

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learned at PUP, which I worked
alongside a third-year medical

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student.

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And her research
project was really

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focusing on cause
specific mortality rates

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due to ischemic strokes
in low and middle income

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countries, which have really
risen in the past 25 years.

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And they've gone
down significantly

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in more prevalent countries.

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So those two combined, I am
going as far away from-- well,

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not as far away as possible.

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But far away from economics.

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And because I am
not somebody who

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can sit in a cubicle for
eight hours a day and type.

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And I am actually
developing my own major.

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It is called business
health economics.

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And I really want to develop
a health care system,

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or work towards developing
a health care system that

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is accessible to way more people
than its accessible to today,

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and caters to way more people
than it is catering today,

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especially in
developing countries.

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Lastly, these are some pictures
I took during my time in Kenya.

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This monkey I fell in love with.

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It was holding my hand.

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That's my hand.

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Jumping all over
me the whole time.

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And so yeah.

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That was my best friend
that I made in Kenya.

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And then there are
some camels that we

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saw walking around, zebras.

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Those are water buffalo.

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And, of course, that baby
elephant is adorable.

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Yep.

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Woo!

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Woo!

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Thank you.

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[CLAPPING]

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Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo.

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