Pooja Nagpal was teaching self-defense classes to sex-trafficking victims in India this summer when she saw headlines about dozens of girls in the northern city of Bareilly quitting school because of harassment.

The 18-year-old Manhattan Beach resident traveled eight hours to meet with the girls, who told her that their dreams of becoming doctors and software engineers were stifled by daily fear of intimidation, stalking and threats on the way to school.

The stories stayed with Nagpal when she began her freshman year at UC Berkeley last month, and she started to notice something: harassment getting in the way of education is not just a Third World problem.

“I know some people that don’t want to go to the library at 11 at night because they’re scared, but they have to because they have a project due,” she said.

Nagpal, who has trained more than 1,000 disadvantaged women in India and Los Angeles in self-defense in the past three years, was recently named a 2016 winner of the Gloria Barron Prize for Young Heroes.

Only 25 students from across North America earned the distinction and only 15 of them earned a $5,000 scholarship from fantasy author T.A. Barron for their efforts to make positive change in the world.

It’s the latest accolade for Nagpal, who gave a TEDx Talk in Manhattan Beach and was one of 10 National Young Women of Distinction recognized by the Girl Scouts last year.

Today, the electrical engineering and computer science major has less time for taekwondo than she did back home at Mira Costa High School, but she’s still working toward a third-degree black belt.

College life is already informing her activism.

“Sexual assault is an issue a lot of colleges are trying to avoid because it decreases their reputation and alumni donations,” Nagpal said. “It’s horrible that so many cases are swept under the rug.”

She’s working on a smartphone app sharing her instructional self-defense videos that should debut on Google Play in coming months, and she wants to start a program for trainers.

“My dream is to have something on almost every campus in America,” said Nagpal, whose twin sister, Meera, also attends UC Berkeley. They’re not roommates, but live nearby.

Meera taught her sister’s self-defense students English the first time they spent the summer in India in 2013.

Nagpal doesn’t know if she’ll be able to make it back every summer, but she’s still raising funds to send supplies to the Indian schoolgirls through her nonprofit, For a Change, Defend.

“When anyone has to live their life in fear, whether a girl or guy,” she said, “it’s an impediment to education and empowerment.”

For more information about Nagpal’s nonprofit, visit www.forachangedefend.com.