PRIYA KARIM HAJI, although only 24 years old, has an outstanding professional and volunteer record in helping others. While at Stanford, she founded SOAR (Students Offering Alternative Realities), a comprehensive after school program for high school youth from East Palo Alto and Menlo Park. She supervised the program which included tutoring, academic support, and employment program, a newspaper, and preparation for SAT and ACT exams. She served as a facilitator for a weekly substance abuse group at San Quentin Prison, volunteered with the County Aids Program, and was a substance abuse counselor for Links To Positive People- Center for Community Change in East Palo Alto. She helped found a free medical clinic in her hometown of Bryan, Texas, when she was only 20 and initiated a midnight Basketball League for young people while she was in college. Her most recent achievement is the founding of Free At Last Community and Rehabilitation Services, a drug and alcohol recovery program, which in its first year served more than 3,000 clients in East Palo Alto. She presently serves as its Executive Director.
