Keren Herrán is an Individualized Study major with a focus on

“Global Health Considering Environmental Factors”, who will graduate in 2021.

Affiliations:

URA Scholar

Meyerhoff Scholar

Honors College

France-Merrick Scholar

LSAMP Scholar

UMBC Esperanza Scholar

UMBC Zainab Damji Scholar

LaMont Toliver Alumni Memorial Scholar

Title of your research project: Analysis of Mental Well-being of Environmental Migrants in Maryland 

Describe your project:

I aim to identify and assess the mental health consequences that adult environmental migrants experience as a result of their relocation to Maryland. By doing so, I hope to inform health professionals, researchers, and policymakers within Maryland of the psychological state of environmental migrants within our population and how we can best serve their unique mental health needs.

Who is your mentor(s) for your project? Why did you choose them?

My mentor for this research project is Dr. Dawn Biehler, Associate Professor within the Geography and Environmental Systems department. I chose to pursue this investigation under the guidance of Dr. Biehler because she has extensive experience in analyzing the various subfields that intersect within my project    (human geography, environmental justice, and public health) and because she has been an incredible adviser and role model for me during my academic career at UMBC. I have so much to learn from her!

How did you become interested in this project?

I became interested in this project upon meeting with Dr. Biehler the fall of my sophomore year, the fall of 2018, when I met with her to share my public health interests. I expressed to Dr. Biehler that as an aspiring researcher, I wanted to focus my efforts on projects that benefited minority populations, especially Latinos. Dr. Biehler encouraged me to consider how advancing knowledge to solve international health concerns can be done without having to even leave the Baltimore region, given that this area has a wealth of diversity of migrants and refugees. She noted that within Maryland, the topic of analyzing the health consequences faced by individuals who relocate here due to natural disasters, environmental degradation, or climate change, was understudied. She proposed that I consider evaluating how the health conditions of this specific subgroup of migrants change as a result of their migration journey to Maryland and adjustment to a new culture.

This project proposal resonated deeply with my conviction to serve marginalized and underserved communities. Conducting this study is also very personal to me since my family is from Puerto Rico and El Salvador, two regions that have both been hit hard by environmental phenomenon and disasters. After Hurricane Maria, a Category 5 hurricane, hit Puerto Rico in fall 2017, the U.S Census Bureau estimated that 97,000 Puerto Ricans left the island and migrated to the continental United States. Of these thousands of Puerto Ricans, how many suffered a disruption of medical therapies because of their relocation? How many experienced inaccess to their usual medications along their journey? How many faced mental health consequences, such as survivor’s guilt, after their relocation? 

For El Salvador, the nation’s ongoing environmental catastrophe of extreme droughts on the Pacific Coast is increasingly exacerbated by climate change and hotter weather patterns. Honduras, Guatemala, and Nicaragua’s Pacific Coast agrarian communities (the “Dry Corridor” region) are also experiencing this crisis. According to the World Food Program, residents of the Dry Corridor report that recent failed crop seasons have been the worst they have ever seen in the past 35 years. As a result, it is no surprise that the emigration from these counties augmented by 500% between 2010-2015 as more and more farmers have been unable to continue to sustain their livelihood and have decided to migrate in order to escape malnutrition and poverty.  What health consequences do these migrants experience as a result of their environmental migration? Are their needs met by their new host communities despite potential lack of citizen status? Do language barriers pose a threat to the health of this already vulnerable group?

What has been the hardest part about your research/what was the most unexpected thing about being a researcher? 

Although I am currently in the initial stages of my research, I can foresee that it will be difficult to recruit migrants to participate in this interview study and share their experiences with me. Migrants are a vulnerable group in society and can be legitimately distrusting of researchers due to disrespect they have been shown by academics in the past. Furthermore, now that I have narrowed my research question to be an evaluation specifically of how environmental migrant’s mental health changes after migration, I also predict that discussing certain painful memories may cause potential participants to decline wanting to participate in interviews. Thankfully however, the funding UMBC has awarded me via the URA Scholars Program will allow me to purchase gifts as a token of appreciation and thanks that I can use as an incentive for migrants to participate in my study. 

What has been the most rewarding part?

Thus far, conducting preliminary interviews with UMBC college students who are environmental migrants has been incredibly rewarding. I am inspired by my peers’ resilience and optimism despite the mental health challenges they have faced due to their environmental migration journeys. 

How will you disseminate your research?

I will be presenting my research both at URCAD and the INDS Capstone Presentation conference. I hope to submit my presentation to other conferences as well and I aspire to publish my results in an academic journal. 

What is your advice to other students about getting involved in research? 

I would advise other students who are considering getting involved in research to identify professors on campus whose work they find interesting. Chances are that even if you are not sure what project idea you want to pursue, if your interests align with those of your mentor, they can help point you in the right direction and get you started! 

What are your career goals?

I aspire to ultimately enroll in a public health doctoral program that will equip me with the added training and credentials necessary to work in international settings alongside health workers, designing creative programs that mitigate health issues in Latin America and the Caribbean. Organizations such as the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, CARE International, John Snow Inc., ISGlobal, and Jhpiego are all research-based nonprofit institutions I could see myself working in. 

On May 25, 2020 George Floyd was murdered in Minneapolis at the hands of the police, and the event reignited both a national conversation and one at UMBC, about police brutality, the over-incarceration of African-Americans, and the denial of equality and opportunity in the workplace, housing, politics, healthcare, and in particular, education. 

The staff of Undergraduate Research and Prestigious Scholarships wants to affirm our support for and solidarity with our Black students, faculty, and staff at UMBC and beyond. We condemn the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmad Arbery, and Freddie Gray, along with the countless other Black lives that have been taken. We stand in opposition to systemic racism and consciously work to be inclusive of black, brown, queer, women, first-generation, immigrants, disabled, and other underrepresented communities in our programs and opportunities. Those of us who benefit from white privilege commit to doing the work to practice anti-racism and foster inclusivity and diversity in our researchers, speakers, recruitment and outreach, and our language. We will continue to work on these issues with faculty who mentor students, and provide resources to ensure the equal treatment of students of color in our research and scholarship programs. 

We will work to promote a culture of inclusivity in our department. We will be critically engaged with the campus community as we move forward to create real change in this moment and beyond. We are grateful for Dr. Hrabowski and his leadership during these transformative times. We stand by the statement issued by USM leadership and Dr. Hrabowski and take these values as our own. Black Lives Matter. 

YOU ARE (UR) Undergraduate Research!

ur.umbc.edu

My name is Camille Blackford and I am a senior cultural anthropology major and Korean minor here at UMBC. I am also a part of the Humanities Scholars Program, and I am expecting to graduate Spring 2021. The title of my research project is “An Ethnography on the Happiness of UMBC Students During the Corona Virus Pandemic”. 

Describe your project:

With this project I want to examine how the happiness of UMBC students has been impacted by the corona virus pandemic. Additionally, I want to examine what social and cultural resources (i.e. family, friends, student services, unemployment, etc.) students have to draw on that have positively and/or negatively impacted their happiness in the midst of the pandemic. 

Who is your mentor(s) for your project?

My mentors for my project are Dr. Sarah Chard and Dr. Bambi Chapin from the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Health Administration and Policy. I met Dr. Chard when she was my professor for my anthropological theory course, and I met Dr. Chapin when I took her anthropology/Asian studies course on South Asia. I chose them as my mentors because I felt like I really learned a lot when I took their courses and I learned more about myself as an anthropology major. I feel like they will be able to guide me throughout this process and help me find my voice as an anthropologist. 

How did you become interested in this project?

I became interested in this project after I was sent home early from my semester abroad in Bhutan. I was interested in Bhutan and going to Bhutan since my senior year of high school when, one morning, I was watching CBS Sunday Morning News with my mom and they did a segment on Bhutan. During this segment they talked about the idea of “Gross National Happiness” and how the Bhutanese government decided to prioritize the happiness of its citizens over things like GDP. Ever since I learned about Gross National Happiness I fell in love with Bhutan, and last semester I had the opportunity to study abroad there. Unfortunately, due to the corona virus, I was sent home early. I became interested in this research during this period of time where I was on my way back home and then during my self-quarantine that followed afterward (which actually wound up coinciding with the quarantine order for everyone). Everything in my life was changing and this made me wonder how other students at UMBC have been impacted by the virus as well. 

What has been the hardest part about your research/what was the most unexpected thing about being a researcher? 

The hardest part about my research, so far, has mainly been just fleshing it out and developing it. This is my first time doing an independent research project like this on my own and it can be very intimidating, but I am taking it step by step and trying not to get too overwhelmed. The other hard part has been the fact that the campus itself has been shut down because of the corona virus. This means that instead of doing participant observation in-person on campus, I will have to do it via social media through things like Facebook groups, etc. This also means that I will have to conduct interviews via my computer instead of in-person and applications like WebEx have not been working on my laptop.

What has been the most rewarding part?

The most rewarding part of this research will be being able to hear other students’ stories and experiences and getting to hear how other people my age have been handling everything that has been going on. The other rewarding part is that this research could provide insight into how students cope with times of uncertainty like this. I have never experienced anything like this in my life, and this is the case for most of the other students as well. Hopefully, this research will be able to show the different ways in which people cope/deal with something like this in which their whole world is turned upside down. 

How will you disseminate your research?

I will present this research at URCAD in April.

What is your advice to other students about getting involved in research?

My advice to other students getting involved in research is that even though the whole idea of starting an independent research project can seem very intimidating, you just have to believe in yourself and your abilities and take a leap of faith. Find something you are passionate about and reach out to your professors, they are there to help you and they have experienced what it is like to do a research project for the first time and will probably have some very valuable advice. Lastly, trust yourself, believe in yourself and don’t give up, even when it gets hard or you get frustrated. 

What are your career goals?

I am currently in the process of applying for a Fulbright research award and I hope to be able to do a comparative study at a university in South Korea. This means that I want to do a similar research project in South Korea and compare my findings from a university in South Korea to my findings from UMBC. After this, or if I don’t get the research award, I plan on applying to graduate school and continuing to study anthropology. 

Applications are open through May 15th!

ur.umbc.edu/ura