When Presidential Scholar Urjoshi Kar’s father moved the family to Georgia, there is no way he could have predicted the impact this would have on so many other lives.
“When I was a freshman in high school, a friend of my family’s daughter was found drugged on the Mexican border. She was the victim of a human trafficking ring,” Kar said. “Luckily, she was found before things got really bad.
“My twin sister Aratrika and I looked into it and learned that Atlanta was a major hotspot for abductions and trafficking. That’s when we started a movement called Unchained, that is now a nonprofit, to make people aware of the problem and to save lives,” she said.
Kat was the president of her Health Occupation Students of America chapter in high school, which gave her a pretty big megaphone to spread the word. The sisters gathered friends, planned workshops and set up info booths at regional and national conferences.
This should give you some idea of how Urjoshi approaches life: If there’s a problem, someone needs to fix it. She’s obviously not going to wait and hope that others will step up. This might explain how she ended up in the Honors College at Georgia State.
“I wanted to be a pediatrician when I was younger, so I was always thinking of a career in medicine. My grandfather was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease a few years ago and that had a big impact. I learned of the innovative research in neuroscience that was underway at Georgia State and decided I wanted to learn more,” she said. “Maybe I could find a way to help my own grandfather.”
Because she is in the Honors College, Kar is afforded the opportunity to be part of the University Assistantship Program where she can begin research as a first year and receive mentoring from expert Georgia State faculty and staff.
“This is an amazing opportunity to really see what goes on in research and how I might find my career path in the future,” Kar said.
In her spare time, she keeps close to her family roots — they’re from Kolkata, India — by studying classical Indian dance (Kathak and Odissi), performing at events and playing music.
“There are so many opportunities at Georgia State. I don’t want to miss out on anything. One thing I have my eye on is bringing Unchained to campus,” she said.
To learn more about the Presidential Scholarship, Georgia State’s most prestigious and valuable academic award, go to honors.gsu.edu/the-presidential-scholarship.
Story by Boyd Baker, photo by Meg Buscema