USA: Immigrant Students Graduate With Honours

Zujaja Tauqeer fled Pakistan with her parents to escape persecution. Her parents, both physicians, sought asylum in the United States after her father was arrested and vandals destroyed her parents’ free, rural clinic because they belong to the Ahmadi sect of Islam.

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | US Desk
Source/Credit: The City University of New York |
By The University | June 20, 2011


Hailing from countries as varied as Togo and Sri Lanka, Poland and the Dominican Republic, immigrant students made their mark among The City University of New York’s Class of 2011, winning competitive academic honors and heading for some of the finest graduate programs in the world.

High-achieving immigrants graduating from CUNY’s two-year and four-year colleges are plunging into fields spanning medicine and scientific research, forensics, teaching and law at prestigious institutions including Harvard Medical School and Stanford Law.



This year’s graduates reflect the University’s historic and continuing commitment to providing access, opportunity and support to immigrants and their children. Students whose native language is not English comprise some 47 percent of CUNY students, while 37 percent of first-time freshmen are born outside the U.S. mainland.

“For New York’s immigrant students, CUNY is the golden door to a wealth of academic opportunity,” said Chancellor Matthew Goldstein. “We are proud that these graduates chose to pursue their educations – and their futures – here and we know that they are part of this University’s continued success.”

CUNY’s fifth Rhodes Scholar, Zujaja Tauqeer, who is enrolled in the combined Brooklyn College-SUNY Downstate College of Medicine B.A.-M.D. program, will attend Oxford University in England this fall for an M. Phil. in the history of medicine.

Tauqeer fled Pakistan with her parents to escape persecution. Her parents, both physicians, sought asylum in the United States after her father was arrested and vandals destroyed her parents’ free, rural clinic because they belong to the Ahmadi sect of Islam.

Tauqeer says her Rhodes Scholarship – the world’s premier academic award – “will give me invaluable training as an historian in order to formulate national and international public health policies attuned to the historical context of Pakistan and other developing countries in the Islamic world.”

Immigrants are well represented among CUNY winners of other prestigious awards. Winners of this year’s Fulbright grants include students originally from Poland, Chile and Hungary. [more]


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