At first glance, UCSD senior Brittaney Khong is like a lot of other college students: bright, articulate, energetic, passionate. “I love UCSD!” is her answer when asked about her college experience. “I got here and just found a fit…everyone was so welcoming.” She has a smile and an attitude that belie the weighty concerns she carries with her on a daily basis, and she’s committed to her studies and to helping others even as she struggles with her own challenges.
UCSD senior Brittaney Khong
Brittaney is also unique in many ways, with a background that is unlike so many of her peers. It’s no doubt difficult for most Americans to comprehend what her parents went through to come to America, to pursue the dream that so many immigrants have of a better life on our shores, and it’s hard to imagine the struggles they’ve endured in their lifetimes to make a better life for their children.
Brittaney’s parents were both Vietnam War refugees who fled a homeland in chaos. They arrived in America a generation ago with little more than a desire to succeed in a new world, pursuing the same dream generations of immigrants before them had.
Brittaney’s mother escaped Vietnam with just the clothes she was wearing as she fled. She was only 11 years old.
Brittaney’s father, at age 19, literally walked from Vietnam through Cambodia to the safety of a refugee camp in Thailand. That’s akin to walking the length of the state of California on foot, with little food or water or clothing, while avoiding the perils of roving enemy soldiers along the way. At age 19.
Brittaney’s future is looking much brighter these days
These experiences left scars upon Brittaney’s parents that they’ve wrestled with ever since, and it has not been an easy road. Brittaney’s father has battled a gambling addiction for many years, and her mother has wrestled with severe bouts of depression. Both felt hopeless due to their lack of education, and they saw no way to improve their lot in life.
Brittaney and her siblings were forced to grow up quickly. As their parents struggled to acclimate in difficult circumstances, their children had no choice but to mature quickly and even in some ways act as parents themselves. By age 12 Brittaney was already raising her siblings, and in some ways caring for her parents as well.
Brittaney’s parents lived in poverty as they raised a family, yet despite their challenges individually and collectively they stayed together and focused on providing a brighter future for their children than they had as young people themselves.
“Neither (of my parents) was able to attend college. My parents always pushed my siblings and me to do our very best and made sure that we knew that college was our ticket to a better life.”
Brittaney’s experience as the child of refugees has influenced her deeply.
“I’ve always wanted to work with refugees,” she says. “I work with this Burmese refugee family, because I want them to know that someone cares. I do my best to help the children with their homework and the parents with their English. And when I have enough time, I take the family on little outings to museums, farms, the market, and more.”
She does this in her spare time, juggling such volunteerism with her studies and her numerous roles in student government at UCSD. She has served the past three years on the Student Council at Warren College, and the last two years as a member of the UCSD Student Foundation, for which she served as President in 2011-12.
Her time working with the UCSD Student Foundation has been “the most fulfilling experience I’ve ever had,” she says unequivocally. “It gives me a chance to give back. I’ve benefitted from scholarships to be able to go to UCSD, and this allows me to help other students who will come after me…I wouldn’t have this experience anywhere else.”
Brittaney helped the UCSD Student Foundation recruit a record number of student donors during Welcome Week 2011
Indeed, UCSD’s is the only student foundation in the UC system, and there are only five student-run foundations nationwide. As President, Brittaney played an instrumental role in the organization securing a record number of gifts from current students last year, gifts that will support future students in need.
Meanwhile, Brittaney has excelled in her studies and pursued opportunities that will lead her toward a career in medicine. During her freshman year, she participated in the Howard Hughes Medical Institute National Phage Genomics Research Initiative.
“I researched bacteriophage via virus isolation and DNA annotation. Through my work, I have contributed to bacteriophage research that may be used to develop phage therapy for diseases such as tuberculosis. This was an incredible experience for a freshman biology major.”
As Brittaney has worked so hard to succeed in school (she carries a 3.93 grade point average) while working part-time, volunteering, and committing to leadership roles on campus, she has continued to face hardships. In fact, despite her successes at UCSD, she was facing the very real prospect of having to drop out of school before her senior year due to mounting financial hardships. All hope was quickly dissipating this spring as she looked ahead to the fall, the prospect of yet another hike in tuition due to the state’s mounting financial problems, and family troubles that might have forced her to return home. On top of that, she was diagnosed with a tumor in her knee that needed to be removed, and as this is written she is undergoing surgery with hopes that it is benign.
It was about that time, just a few weeks ago, that she received a call from former ASUCSD President David Marchick ‘88 informing her that she’d been selected as the inaugural recipient of the Tom Tucker Student Leaders Scholarship, the single largest scholarship ever awarded to a UCSD student, enough to cover her tuition, books, and associated living expenses for her senior year. A committee comprised of alumni who had been student leaders during their time at UCSD selected Brittaney from a host of qualified applicants because her story and her achievements were so powerful.
“I was in shock,” she says now, after several weeks to process the news. “I still am. Oh my God. Especially this year…everything seemed to be going downhill for me. I was about to lose my apartment. I was diagnosed with a tumor. I really thought all my hard work would go to waste.”
UCSD alumnus Dave Marchick ’88 announced the creation of the Tom Tucker Student Leaders Scholarship Fund at an event on campus last fall
Brittaney was so consumed with keeping her head above water that she had forgotten she had even applied for the Tucker Scholarship, an award made possible by Marchick and his wife, Pam Kurland, with an initial gift of more than $100,000. That gift is now being augmented by gifts from a host of other former UCSD student leaders who worked with and know Dr. Tommy Tucker, including major gifts from Mark Boroditsky ’85 and Mary Rose Alexander ‘86. The ultimate goal? An endowment of at least $250,000 that will support the entire annual cost of education of an accomplished UCSD student leader with significant financial need, each and every year, forever.
When asked what the scholarship means to her, she replies, “I can’t even say what it means to me. It told me I have to keep going. It told me there’s always something to look forward to. It gave me hope.”
“I’m incredibly grateful,” she continues. “This means even more coming from alumni who maybe shared some the experiences I’ve had and wanted to give back,” Brittaney continues. “They had great experiences at UCSD and their desire to pass it on to others just means so much. It shows me that these are people who really care.”
Brittaney is looking ahead to a future that includes graduation, medical school, and giving back to her community
And for Brittaney’s parents, who escaped a war-torn homeland to come to America?
“It means everything. Really. My mom cried when I called her to tell her.”
The Tucker Scholarship was established for students just like Brittaney Khong, an accomplished student leader who plans to pursue joint graduate degrees in medicine and public health and become a pediatrician who gives back to her community, as she has been doing throughout her college years. Students like Brittaney embody all that Dr. Tommy Tucker fostered in his many years working with student leaders at UCSD, and his work lives on in the pursuits of the students whose educations will be aided by the Tucker Fund.
No 11-year-old should have to flee her homeland, and no 19-year-old-old should have to traverse two countries on foot to seek safety. No 12-year-old should need to care for her own parents as they wrestle with poverty and depression. Yet these things have all happened in Brittaney Khong’s family. She grew up knowing she would change the course of her family’s future.
“I wanted a better life for myself, my siblings, and my parents,” Brittaney says. “No matter what it took, I was going to go to college.”
Now, thanks to the Tucker Scholarship, she’ll be able to finish what she started.
