PUBLISHED BY MOSHOLU PRESERVATION CORPORATION

Lehman Grad Masters Field and New Country 

By HEATHER HADDON

Seven years ago, when Olanta Barton first arrived in the Bronx from Tobago, she feared taking the No. 4 train by herself. Now, she's not only overcome her own fears, but as a newly minted graduate receiving the highest honors in Psychology from Lehman College, she's on an express path to help others do the same. 

"This is the culmination of everything I've been working for," said Barton, a Norwood resident, days before commencement. Though a fastidiously dressed and poised 25-year-old, the mere mention of graduation made her shout in delight. 

She celebrated her successes with 2,171 other Lehman graduates, the largest class in the school's 35-year history. U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer delivered the commencement address on a sun-drenched Friday morning last week. 

Barton has a lot to be proud of. She is her family's first college graduate. And, adding a feather to her graduation cap, Barton received this year's honors prize in psychology.

"She is the very best among the best," said Gisela Jai, an associate psychology professor at Lehman. "She's really an impressive student."

But getting to this level of achievement wasn't easy. While the story of hardworking immigrants isn't new, Barton's success is remarkable. "She's certainly right up there with the best of them," said Vincent Prohaska, head of Lehman's Psychology Department.

While Barton has taken advantage of every scoring opportunity, it took the sheer will of her mother to first get her onto the academic playing field. "I wanted the best for her and her brother," said Inez Barton, Olanta's mother. "And the opportunity wasn't there [in Tobago]."

Tobago, officially a republic with Trinidad, is the less developed of the twin islands. Just off the coast of Venezuela, Tobago is only eight miles wide with a total population of 51,000.

Barton waxes nostalgic over small-town life. "I miss that closeness," she said. "You do something in town during the day, and by the evening, almost everyone knows."

But neither island offered adequate higher education. The one university, on Trinidad, is pricey. "It's really competitive to get a scholarship, or you'll spend your life in debt," Barton said. "I didn't like those options."

Neither did her mother. "It was a hard decision," said the elder Barton about her move to the U.S., leaving her husband and relatives behind. But it was clearly worth the sacrifice. "The belief for Trinidadians is that if we can't get it here, we are going to go wherever it is," she said. 

That quest brought the Bartons to the Bronx. "There were all of these huge buildings and noise," Barton remembers. "Trinidad is a cosmopolitan society. But the city's diversity is like 100-fold."

Both mother and daughter got thrown into that mix immediately, with the senior Barton working at a nursing facility and the younger following suit. During her first two years at Lehman, Barton continued to work as a nurse's aide.

Though Barton wove her health care experience into her studies, after taking physics and chemistry classes she knew medicine wasn't her strong suit. A good listener, Barton gravitated toward psychology -- an unusual field in Tobago.

"We had one visiting psychologist for both islands," she said. In a culture that still often sees mental illness stemming from supernatural causes, therapy is viewed with suspicion. "You say you're depressed . . . or you need counseling services, then you're told to go talk to your friends or family."

But psychology isn't just, as Barton put it, "sitting on the couch and paying me lots of money." As she began her research, Barton's abilities blossomed. 

"In a way, we worked like colleagues," said Professor Jai, Barton's research advisor. "Many students come to their professors and assist them on a project they set up. Olanta came up with her own idea. It really distinguished her from other students."

Her honors project topic was examining the way immigrants acclimate to America's confusing health care system. "We really know these problems," said Jai, originally from China. "It's very understudied."

But Barton is bringing attention to the issue. She presented her findings at the Eastern Psychological Conference last March. A month later, Barton spoke at Lehman's Undergraduate Research Conference, and her abstract was selected for one of three Psi Chi Awards. Barton has been the president of Psi Chi, the psychology honors society, for the last two years. 

"Usually student organizations rollercoaster a bit, but ours has really continued strong," said Prohaska, Lehman's Psi Chi faculty advisor. "She not only kept our undergraduate research conference going, but expanded it."

That expansion took grunt work. "We did a lot of bake sales," Barton said. 

Barton has come to feel very much at home at Lehman in her years there. Though she didn't have much time for racket ball or drawing, two of her hobbies, she formed strong bonds with her peers.

Now applying to doctorate programs in behavioral psychology, Barton plans to stay in the U.S. for some time, and is appreciating some of the country's ways. "I could only have dark braids at home," said Barton, fingering the tiny pink braids she put in before graduation. "Here, you can put canary yellow braids in your hair and no one cares."

But she can't ignore the tug of home -- where the climate, both culturally and weather-wise, is warmer. "I still consider myself West Indian," said Barton, who plans to return to Tobago later on in her career. "That's where my roots are."