Kathy Choi '09

Kathy Choi Torrance, California Major: Cultural Anthropology Minor: Political Science

For Kathy Choi, distance is no obstacle when pursuing her passions.

A first-generation American whose parents emigrated from Seoul, South Korea, Choi lived for a number of years in Los Angeles's Koreatown district, where she witnessed tension between Korean-American and African-American communities during the L.A. riots of 1992 and their aftermath. Those experiences helped shape her interest in history, racial understanding and cultural identity, and gave her a desire to improve race relations.

Most of her California friends went to college close to home. She looked at schools in the Northeast, then the South to find the best match for her interests. At Duke, she has found an intellectual home in the Center for Race Relations and is teaching a house course titled "Black, White and Shades of Gray."

"I was drawn to the Center for Race Relations even before I got to Duke," she says. "I randomly found a Chronicle article that mentioned it and was intrigued that a top-tier university would have an organization devoted solely to these issues. As for the house course, I've found there is nothing more rewarding that teaching a class full of socially-minded and passionate people who are my peers."

Besides studying and teaching, the financial aid recipient is gathering as many experiences as she can during her time at Duke. She has volunteered with kindergarteners at George Watts Elementary School, a part of the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership. She is active in her sorority, Alpha Delta Pi, the oldest Greek society for women on campus, and helps Duke to welcome official visitors through the Dukes and Duchesses organization.

Choi said she likes North Carolina, but remains loyal to California -- one wall of her room is draped with the Golden Bear flag. Most of all she loves to travel. As a high school senior, she was the governor of the southwestern region of the Key Club, a student service organization, and flew from state to state, including side trips to Alabama and Hawaii, to keep Key Club's affairs in order. That same year she rode on the Kiwanis International float in the Rose Parade, which won the Queen's Award for the best designed float less than 30 feet long.

"Traveling by myself was a little scary at first, but I think I grew up faster," she says. "And riding on the float was great. I worked on the floats for four years; the last year I got to ride on it."

Her long-distance explorations continue. Last summer she spent six weeks working with students at a non-profit called Legal Outreach, Inc., in Brooklyn, N.Y., where she lived with a Duke alumni family. The rest of the summer she spent in England as a student in the Duke in Oxford program.

Most recently, she visited Washington, D.C., to interview for a summer internship. She has investigated opportunities in education, economics, transportation, community development and urban planning. She's unsure which direction to take and sometimes worries about making the "wrong choice." Nonetheless, she has her sights set on Teach for America or the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP).

"The lessons I've learning from teaching my class have been invaluable -- and reinforced my desire to work for Teach for America," she says. "Teaching is tough, challenging, and often frustrating work, but in the end, the rewards are great. My experience has also shed light on the power of education as a vehicle of social change, and though progress may come in slow steps, and often not fast enough, most times it does indeed happen."