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Magazine Editor:
Jessica Vosgerchian
Editor in Chief
Gary Graca
Managing Editor:
Courtney Ratkowiak
Photo Editor:
Sam Wolson
Multimedia Editor:
David Azad Merian
The Junk Drawer:
Brian Tengel
Center spread design:
Lan Truong
Cover photo:
Sam Wolson
The Statement is The Michigan
Daily's news magazine, distributed
every Wednesday during the
academic year
new rules
rule 197:
Don't bully your
friends into
getting season
football tickets.
You'll feel like a
jerk when they
cop out of most
of the games
next fall. rule
198: Only ask
your housemate
to turn down
music if he went
to bed alone. In
the other case,
wait 15 minutes
until the sex is
over. rule 199:
Vegans don't
have the right to
bitch about the
soap you have in
your bathroom.
- E-mail rule submissions to
TheStatement@umich.edu
Engineering senior Julia Samorezov
likes to spread herself thin. Involved in
the engineeringhonor society Tau Beta Pi,
the Engineering Ambassadors and a ser-
vice sorority, Samorezov has the immedi-
ate collegiate community covered. Now,
she's looking beyond Ann Arbor.
Samorezov is vice president and co-
founder of Michigan Health Engineered
for All Lives (M-HEAL), astudent organi-
zation founded in 2006 to design medical
equipment for needy communities in the
developing world.
"We started out with a broad, naive
idea of'we want to help people,' "Samore-
zov said. "But we're narrowing that down
into ways we can actively help people."
Last year, M-HEAL designed a surgi-
cal lamp with back-up battery power that
can be used in areas with inconsistent
electricity. The group plans to send the
first prototype of the lamp to Uganda to
receive feedback on its designfrom health
providers working in clinics there.
M-HEAL also conducts a 'survey
of need' to address the lack of medical
resources in underprivileged communi-
ties and works with Detroit-based World
Medical Relief to, among other things,
repair used medical equipment.
And despite her part in M-HEAL's
recent success, Samorezov doesn't take
pride in her own achievements with the
organization so much as in its future.
"Next year on the executive board,
there's not going to be any of the origi-
nal M-HEAL founders," Samorezov said.
"And that's really exciting."
Given her modesty, it's appropriate
that as M-HEAL's vice president, Samor-
ezov assumes a more behind-the-scenes
role. But her contributions haven't gone
unnoticed.
"The idea for M-HEAL was origi-
nally Julia's," Stephen DeWitt, one of
M-HEAL's three co-founders and head of
the surgical lamp team, said in an e-mail.
"Julia called me and told me her idea and I
agreed to help bring it to fruition, but she
was definitely the driving force behind
everything."
It seems that all those connected to
M-HEAL are quick to heap praise on
Samorezov.
"She leads by example and expects
no less of herself than she does others,"
Engineering Prof. Aileen Huang-Saad,
who advises M-HEAL, said in an e-mail.
"When the people around her see her
efforts, they easily follow. These leader-
ship skills are unique."
- STEPHEN OSTROWSKI
Trade in your CARHART and NORTH FACE for
SUNGLASSES
and... more classes?
In response to increased student demand,
the COLLEGE OF LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND THE ARTS has expanded
its 2009 spring/summer course offerings.
Sign-up for these new classes when registration begins in March.
Read more, including the list of new options, at www.sa.umich.edu/lsa/sewcourses.,
.SA
LIKE THE INTERNET?
WE DO, TOO.
WORK FOR OUR
ONLINE STAFF.
E-mail graca@michigandaily.com
Teweedbefr finals Iast Decem-
bet, LSA junior Moustafa Moustafa wasn't
studyingfor his anatomy exam that Monday.
He was driving a rental truck to Chicago
through a snowstor.
The truck contained medical supplies
that nterfaith campus roup Children
of Abraha had collected and Moustafa was
rush'n to get the supplies on a container
bound for Iraq
The group, which includes Muslim, Jew-
ish and Christian student from the Muslim
Students' Association, Hillel and StMary's
Student Parish, opends thousands of hours
collecting and sorting recently expired or
unwanted medical supplies to ship to clinics
KRISTA BoYD/eay For Moustafa, who founded the group on
campus two and a half years ago after being
inspired by a group of the same name based
in Indiana, service to the poor and sick is
central to his Muslim faith. But faith isn't
the only reason students volunteer with the
group.
"We are handling the very supplies that
might have the potential to save lives or ease
sufferingabroad,so Ithink people are drawn
to that intimacy," Moustafa said.
Working out the logistical details likefind-
ing cheap warehouse space close to campus,
devising a system to sort thousands of differ-
ent supplies and fundraising was a challenge
in getting the project off the ground, he said.
This summer, the group shipped a con-
tainer full of about a million dollars worth of
medical supplies to Tanzania, and last week-
end, they sealed a container bound for clinics
in Ghana.
Moustafa, who was recently honored
with a Michigan Leadership Award, credits
the group's success to its interfaith nature
because the diversity of the group's members
has given ita far-reaching base for network-
ing. In order to put campus diversity to use,
student groups must engage each other, he
said.
To illustrate the point, Moustafa quoted
an analogy from the Interfaith Youth Core, a
nationalgroup that Moustafa belongs to that
promotes religious pluralism: "Diversity is
like a bunch of different people on an eleva-
tor together. They're just there. Pluralism is
them working together."
- KELLYFRASER