Ellyn Kaschak always saw higher education as a priority, but found that financing it was a challenge. To help others get around this, she founded a grant that will provide a Binghamton University student with an opportunity to conduct research in the field of social justice for women and girls.

Through multiple scholarships and student grants, Kaschak was able to graduate from Harpur College in 1965. After receiving her Ph.D. in clinical psychology at Ohio State University, she is now a professor emerita of psychology at San Jose State University in California and a professor in the gender studies program at the University for Peace in Costa Rica. She is also the author of the book “Endangered Lives: A New Psychology of Women’s Experience.”

The $1,500 Dr. Ellyn Uram Kaschak Summer Research Grant, which will be funded yearly by Kaschak, is set to begin this summer. Students in Harpur College with at least a 3.0 GPA and interest in research in the field of social justice for women and girls can apply through the Harpur Edge page; applications for this summer are due this Friday, April 8. The grant recipient will also have the opportunity to present their research findings to Kaschak during the following semester.

Kaschak said she hopes that this grant will allow undergraduate students to have a very different experience than traditionally held in the classroom and hopefully introduce them to the need for social change. She said that she was influenced by prior social justice movements and she hopes this grant will help get others involved as well.

“As it happened, I was finally touched by the feminist movement of the 1970’s to develop consciousness of the power differences among people and nations and to devote myself to doing something about it,” Kaschak wrote in an email.

As a student, Kaschak started out majoring in psychology, but because of a pivotal moment in her undergraduate college career, she switched to majoring in Russian language and literature.

“One day, I was in lab running my rat when it turned and bit me,” Kaschak wrote. “I went to the health clinic, got a tetanus shot and switched my major to Russian language and literature. When I found my way back to psychology in graduate school, I found that a liberal arts education had prepared me well.”

According to Kaschak, her time at Harpur College was memorable but very different from the experiences of students now, since the school was then still in its transitional years.

“Harpur was still in its infancy and so the physical campus was a challenge and we all slogged through the mud and snow in the winter and just plain mud in the spring rains,” Kaschak wrote. “However, the Student Union was always warm and served hot coffee that could endlessly be refilled, so there we gathered to meet friends, do homework and keep warm for a thin dime.”

According to Wendy Neuberger, the director of Harpur Edge, this grant presents a great opportunity for students looking to do research in this field.

“Harpur College undergraduate students can apply for money to help fund summer research in the field of social justice for women and girls,” Neuberger said. “This is a fantastic opportunity for a student to gain research experience in a meaningful area.”