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Kasbidi was one of 60 Academic Team members selected
from a total of 1,528 students nationwide seeking associate’s
degrees who were nominated for the award. She was among
such diverse winners as a17-year-old student who was
home schooled all his life, to a 35-year-old student
and mother of three who opened a soup kitchen for the
homeless in Oklahoma.
Selected students were divided into First, Second and
Third teams, with each team consisting of 20 students.
Kasbidi was named to the Third team. All selected students
received trophies -- and a $2,500 cash award -- during
the American Association of Community Colleges convention
in Minneapolis held last week.
“I think it’s a honor. I really was so
happy when I got it,” says Kasbidi of the USA
TODAY award. “It’s like, ‘Oh, somebody
sees what you are doing.’ What I do won’t
go silent.”
Juggling a part-time job, full-load of classes, a May
graduation, and parents who work long hours to keep
their family of five afloat, Kasbidi has never focused
much on getting recognized for her own hard work and
academic achievements. Instead, her thoughts centered
on her family, who came to the United States from Tehran,
Iran nearly four years ago.
“My father has a Master’s Degree in mathematics,
and was a math professor in Iran,” says Kasbidi,
who lives with her parents -- her father Gholam and
her mother Farideh, and two younger brothers in Southwest
Houston. “But he didn’t think his children
would get the same educational opportunity in Iran as
we can here. The reason my parents wanted to move here
was because of us.”
Kasbidi says her parents could not speak English when
they arrived, so they both took English as a Second
Language classes at HCC, as well as various jobs to
keep the family together. Her brothers, Amir, 20, and
Morteza, 18, currently attend HCC Southwest, majoring
in business and computer science, respectively.
But it was the serious illness of a family member that
steered Kasbidi on her career path. The family member,
whom she doesn’t want identified, developed gum
cancer. With help from American and Iranian community
organizations, the family member recovered. It was then
that Kasbidi decided she could repay the kindness through
dentistry.
“I want to help people,” says Kasbidi,
who will apply to dental schools in Los Angeles or San
Antonio after receiving her associate’s degree
on May 8. “I don’t want to be a dentist
because of money. I want to help people, poor people,
because our family got help and I know what it means.”
Her social concern also extends to her other passion:
improving women’s and children’s rights.
“I have been a journalist since I was nine years
old,” says Kasbidi, who writes in Persian for
www.WomenInIran.org on the Internet. Her most recent
work involves an Iranian woman who was sentenced to
death for killing the man who tried to rape her.
“The problem is, if the woman had been raped,
she would have been considered sinful in Iran and she
would be sentenced to death because of it,” Kasbidi
says. “Either way, she is sentenced to death,
so what’s the difference? It’s disgusting.
Women don’t get the respect they deserve in Iran.
The human rights every human should have, they don’t
get it.”
That’s why her phone message reveals a women’s
rights message. “I love Iran. It is my country,”
Kasbidi says. “And my friends know this is how
I feel about this issue. My girl friends all like the
message. But my male friends say things like, ‘Why
did you put that on your phone? What do you mean?’
One close male friend said to me, ‘If you want
to be my friend, you’ll change that message.’
I told him, ‘If you want to be my friend, you’ll
hear it. I’m not going to change it.’ ”
Kasbidi says the friend is still with her.
He must have realized the award-winning student could
teach him a thing or two.
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