Out to change the world

Kalyaani Patel enjoys being pushed out of her comfort zone. It’s something she’s sought out since an early age. At age 11, her parents allowed her to leave her Zambian home where they had relocated when she was young and attend boarding school in her native India. This did have its challenges for the young adventure-seeker. “It was a bit of a culture shock, going from Zambia to India,” she shares. “It took me at least a year to settle in.” After high school graduation, Kalyaani returned to Zambia. Instead of going straight to college, she took a “gap year” and volunteered in Zambia for Population Council, a New York-based organization researching AIDS and HIV. This experience sparked her interest in psychology and she decided she was ready for college. The University of Cincinnati appealed to her, in part, because she had two cousins enrolled here. This time the transition was easy. “I thought when I had come from Zambia to here, it would have another culture shock, Kalyaani says. “But I actually made friends quickly.”