When senior Julia S. Goldberg was growing up in her Arizona home speaking English, Spanish and Portuguese, she didn't realize how unique or important her language skills would be.
But at Tufts, Goldberg has put them to good use. As a community health and Spanish double major, a Latino studies minor and a scholar with the Tisch College, she has been working with Somerville's Brazilian and Hispanic immigrant communities to survey occupational environmental health risks that affect the community. With the data, Goldberg aims to understand the main occupational concerns to improve the overall health of the community.
In the spring of 2005, Goldberg started a multilingual health fair program sponsored by the Immigrant Service Providers Group of Somerville. The fair brought in different organizations and groups as well as professors from the Friedman School of Nutrition to discuss issues concerning women's health.
"That one health fair I started, I set up - it was my baby, so to speak," Goldberg said. "We've had more since then. We usually have one [at least] once a semester."
The immigrant health project became Goldberg's Tisch Scholar project, and her research grew out of her interest in the issue. Since the first fair, she has worked as a Spanish-English medical interpreter and has trained high school students in Somerville to do the same. She said she hopes to break the language barrier between medical professionals and local immigrants.
"I got the idea to kind of fuse the interpreting with a health fair," Goldberg said.
Goldberg said she initially came to Tufts so she could study in the East and experience something new. But while Goldberg said that she has enjoyed studying at Tufts, she said she still feels more at home in the Southwest.
"I don't take advantage of the liberal atmosphere of Boston," she said, explaining that it is too different from the environment at home in Arizona.
After becoming initially involved in the immigrant community of Somerville, Goldberg left her junior year to go abroad with the Tufts-in-Madrid program. The experience, she said, proved to be anything but ordinary.
Just as she had settled in to her life in Spain, Goldberg learned that she had won the prestigious Truman Scholarship, which compelled her to fly home to Tucson for five days. Though Goldberg was able to find time to win the scholarship and further explore her passion for Portuguese literature while abroad, she said she missed the community involvement she'd felt at Tufts.
"I felt very disconnected during my time abroad," Goldberg said.
Back at Tufts, Goldberg has once again focused on immigrant health issues, specifically those related to the US.-Mexico Border. As an Arizona native, Goldberg said, she feels directly affected by the issue, and believes that having a bi-national commission could be a step towards improving healthcare.
Earlier this month, Goldberg was honored as a College Academic All-Star by USA Today. Goldberg is also a member of both the track and cross-country teams at Tufts, and she plans to run the marathon this year as part of the President's Marathon Challenge.
As she continues her studies, Goldberg hopes to concentrate on how Public Health is affected by immigration. She is enrolled in Tufts' five-year Master of Public Health program, and will be taking all of her classes at the Tufts Medical School next year. Over the summer, she will begin an internship at the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C.
As for the future, Goldberg is unsure, but knows that she doesn't want to take the conventional approach and work in a clinic.
"There are different options," she said. "I could either apply to nurse practitioner's school, medical school, or go straight into the government."
