Wednesday, April 15, 2015 // The Statement 
 
5B

Keya Patel by: Emilie Plesset, Daily News Editor

Natasha Dabrowski by: Tanya Madhani, Daily Staff Reporter

Hannah Lee by: Caroline Filips, Daily Arts Writer 

learning from us is an integral 
experience because that’s what 
it will be like in the real world, 
you’re not just like surrounded 
by people who are just like you 
in terms of your academic back-
ground,” 
Patel 
said. 
“Having 

people that are not engineers do 
provide a lot of benefits. I think 
people value that too.”

Though 
as 
president 
Patel 

works with all the BLUElab teams, 
she first began her involvement as 
a member and then project leader 
of BLUElab Sa Nimá Collabora-
tive, a project working to bring 
nighttime lighting to Samox San 
Luca, Guatemala. The town cur-
rently uses candles for lighting 

because of limited energy sources. 
Patel has traveled to the project’s 
partner community in Guatemala 
three times.

“That team has definitely been 

the most meaningful to me in 
college, even sometimes more so 
than being President of BLUElab 
because Sa Nimá is the way that I 
got into all this work,” Patel said.

Throughout college Patel was 

also involved with the Ginsburg 
Student Advisory Board and was 
a member of the University figure 
skating team. However, working 
with BLUElab has become her 
primary endeavor.

“I’ve dropped everything else 

that I do just to focus my heart 

into this and be able to provide 
as many hours a week into this as 
possible,” Patel said. “I sometimes 
wish I could have done everything 
I used to be doing, but it’s been 
so worth it to me to put in all this 
effort into BLUElab and see where 
it’s gone this past year and helping 
all our teams as much as I can.”

Engineering junior Katherine 

Rouen, BLUElab internal vice 
president, said Patel has been 
one of the BLUElab’s most trans-
formative presidents and has 
moved the organization forward 
throughout her presidency.

“She’s really been someone who 

has moved BLUElab away from 
solely 
implementing 
technol-

ogy, and being more about think-
ing about the end users and the 
stakeholders that we work with,” 
Rouen said.

Rouen said Patel worked to 

meet with each team and reached 
out to individual team members.

“When she’s involved in some-

thing she’s 100 percent there,” 
said LSA junior Emilee Lewis, a 
member of Sa Nimá Collaborative. 
“I feel like that’s the main thing 
that’s hard to find nowadays. 
When you have a meeting with 
Keya, she is 100 percent present 
and you’re the only thing that 
matters at that moment.”

Patel 
said 
working 
with 

BLUElab has been the most valu-

able experience throughout her 
time at the University. She said the 
skills she has harnessed through 
her leadership within the orga-
nization are very translatable to 
the professional workforce. After 
graduation, Patel will be working 
with sales and business strategy 
for Dropbox.

“Sometimes to me the work I 

do with BLUElab is so much more 
valuable than school stuff,” Patel 
said. “I’ve learned so much more 
out of BLUElab than I ever think 
I would have in class and I spend 
more hours a week doing BLUE 
lab than studying for my classes. 
You learn so much out of it, so it’s 
totally worth it to me in the end.”

international students, with trans-
fer students, with students from 
all across the nation, students who 
have totally different political and 
religious beliefs than myself,” Dab-
rowski said. “The University in a 
lot of ways can create spaces for 
you to talk about those even for 
students who might not self-select 
to create those conversations. It’s 
easy to just go through college 
and just take classes and focus on 
your studies, but I’ve been so much 
more enriched by all of the organi-
zational and academic experiences 
pushing me to go beyond the class-
room.”

Dabrowski endured a long pro-

cess of creating proposals and 
doing research at both the Univer-

sity and peer institutions to judge 
the feasibility of creating the new 
program. Her work culminated 
in speaking in front of the His-
tory department, from whom she 
received the support to continue 
shaping the logistics of the new 
minor.

“It’s still, to date — my LSA stu-

dent government adviser jokes 
— the fastest student government 
project we’ve had ever,” Dabrowski 
added.

But Dabrowski is a determined 

person and navigating the bureau-
cracy of the University is some-
thing that comes naturally to her, 
according to LSA senior Corey 
Walsh, LSA SG vice presiden.

“It’s definitely something that 

does not come easily to many 
people, but with Natasha, it’s like 
a dance,” Walsh said. “She always 
knows who exactly to be speaking 
to, always has the perfect agenda 
and always has a next step, where-
as a lot of people face roadblocks 
and give up because they think it’s 
an unattainable task, but with her 
it’s always ‘here’s our next venue, 
this is where we’re going next, I’ll 
see you at the next meeting.’”

It’s Dabrowski’s friendly and 

energetic personality, Walsh said, 
that really motivates their projects 
and their agendas as student gov-
ernment executives.

“Something that’s most strik-

ing to me about (Dabrowski) is the 
emotional contagion that she has,” 

Walsh said. “She exudes this ener-
gy and light that’s so contagious 
for all of the other people that she 
spends time with. Being around 
her you always feel engaged and 
you always want to care about what 
she cares about because of the emo-
tion that she exudes.”

But out of all of her experiences 

on campus, Dabrowski said she 
will miss the people who have sup-
ported and guided her here most of 
all when she graduates in May.

“In my senior year I’ve been 

able to make even more friends 
and meet even more people,” she 
said. “I think that has created such 
an unforgettable friendship that I 
know those relationships will go 
beyond the campus, but they thrive 

so much here. A couple of months 
from now, I won’t be able to go 
down the street and be able to see 
five of my friends. I’ll have to fly 
across the country perhaps. The 
relationships that you create and 
form from all of these transforma-
tive experiences are ones that I will 
miss the most. I’ll continue them, 
but they’re just going to be differ-
ent.”

Continuing 
her 
government 

and policy-making involvement, 
Dabrowski said she is eyeing a few 
public policy and PR positions in 
Washington, D.C. after graduating.

“I’m still navigating my future,” 

Dabrowski said. “As of right now, 
the nature of politics is that doors 
open very quickly.”

tions, there’s a theme of inclusion 
and diversity and social justice,” 
she said. “That is something I’m 
super passionate about, creating 
spaces for all students on campus 
to feel comfortable. “

Within her sizable sphere of 

campus involvement, comprised 
of contributions she modestly 
regards as “small,” she makes a 
point to help others realize their 
full potential. Even over coffee 
for an interview focused on her 
accomplishments, Lee was more 
interested in the minute details of 
my life than discussing herself.

When she arrived on campus 

by way of her relatively homog-
enous hometown of Rochester, Lee 
sought out opportunities to engage 
in and provide diversity education. 
She immediately became involved 
in the Michigan Community Schol-
ars program because of its social 
justice and community service 
focus. In attempts to foster inclu-
sive environments, Lee facilitates 
weekly 
three-hour 
discussions 

on religion within her Intergroup 
Relations class. Among her group 
of 18 students varying in race, 
gender, religion and sexual ori-
entation, she successfully enables 
forward-thinking conversations of 

coexistence and open-minded per-
spectives. Within the group, she 
makes a point to not only create an 
inclusive and comfortable space for 
all, but also speak from a humanis-
tic standpoint. 

“I know diversity takes time and 

its sometimes hard to understand 
where other people are coming 
from, but if you have more perspec-
tives and if you are understanding 
more people, it really helps you 
become a better person,” she said. 
“There was a moment where I feel 
like my group clicked, it was really 
cool because I know through dia-
logue, it’s changing people’s per-

spectives and how they see the 
world.”

She sources her inspiration 

from her seemingly well-rounded 
upbringing, insisting her parents 
initiated her fascination with dif-
ferent cultures and customs, and 
that she was raised to care and 
fight for others, understand them 
and enact change together.

“My parents gave me experi-

ences to show me that that’s not the 
norm in the world,” she said. “They 
took me on a lot of humanitarian 
and mission trips, we did a lot of 
service in Pontiac and Detroit.”

Looking towards the future of 

her positive pathway, Lee hopes to 
continue utilizing her resources to 
promote causes for social justice, 
ideally in philanthropy, social jus-
tice and dialogue. Last summer she 
found her niche within her work 
for a nonprofit.

“I see philanthropy as your 

time, your treasure, and your tal-
ent. I think my long terms are to 
engage in philanthropy somehow, 
whether that’s working for a non-
profit or for a foundation,” she said. 
“I would love to be a professor one 
day, I think that would be such an 
amazing job, teaching and being 
part of academia.”

