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Dr. Brian Chang adjusts the hood for Travis Kimathi at Commencement 2006. Photo by Peggy Cain. |
“I didn’t have any role models growing up,” Kimathi said.
Raised by his mother and grandmother, Kimathi grew up without a father at home and didn’t meet many male professionals in his Omaha neighborhood.
“I had never seen a dentist who looked like me,” he said. “There wasn’t a dentist in my neighborhood. I had to go far and wide to go to a dentist.”
Kimathi said he visited a dentist for the first time when he was 8 or 9. But, as it turns out, that first visit made quite an impression and piqued his interest in dentistry. “That was a good experience,” he said. “The dentist was very polite and answered all my curiosities.”
In high school, Kimathi set his goal on becoming a dentist.
Academically talented
NU PATHS is designed to recruit academically talented, underrepresented, ethnic minority students into academic programs to prepare them for careers as health care professionals. Kimathi and Mariah Carroll, a 2004 graduate of the College of Dentistry dental hygiene program, were among the first 10 students selected for the inaugural NU PATHS program in 2001.
Kimathi will begin a pediatric residency program at the University of Illinois Hospital and Dental School in Chicago this summer. He wants to eventually practice dentistry in an inner city neighborhood where children need both dental care and role models. “I feel obligated,” he said.
In particular, he wants to mentor young boys who, like him, were raised by strong women, but didn’t have many positive interactions with men. He wants to help them understand the male point of view and realize that there are men, as well as women, to help guide their young lives.
Kimathi emphasized that he wants to do more than treat dental disease in children who live in poor neighborhoods. He wants to lift their spirits and raise their aspirations to let them know they, too, have choices. “I want to go back to an impoverished, inner city area to be able to give some hope to children there,” he said. “If they meet someone who looks like them, who is a dentist, they may have hope.”
Other rewards
His own career aspirations, he acknowledged, are not about financial success. “I have to have meaning,” he said. “I have never had money. I am rewarded in other ways.”
There’s no chance his attitude will change, he said. “The people I surround myself with won’t let me lose it. I am a regular guy; I like to be around regular people.”
Kimathi, who is now married and the father of a young son, grew up in his grandmother’s house, along with lots of family. He said his mother seemed to work all the time at her job on a factory assembly line. He graduated from Burke High School and went to Creighton University on scholarships before transferring to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln to study chemistry. While at UNL, he spent eight months in Ghana in what he describes as one of the best experiences of his life. In addition to seeing the continent of his origins, he also experienced the diversity of the African cultures, languages and landscapes.
For Kimathi, the first two years at the College of Dentistry were traumatic and isolating. He was the only African-American student in the dental program – and one of only a very few African-Americans in the college. “I was used to being one of a few, but being the only one, that was an uncomfortable situation,” he said.
Then, his grandmother, Rosa Jones, died, leaving him devastated. “She was my cornerstone,” he said.
‘Made it happen’
Kimathi is proud that he reached his goal to graduate. With time and effort, dedication and discipline, “I made it happen,” he said.
He is thankful to Dr. Curt Kuster, his mentor, and to his classmates Rusty Lewis and Tim Vacek who were the first to help him break out of his protective isolation and who remained close throughout dental school. He now considers all his classmates part of his extended family.
As for his family, he is thankful to his mother, Angela Wilborn, who went to college when he went to dental school and now teaches in Las Vegas. He also is thankful to his wife, Amber, who has a master’s degree in dietetics and nutrition and will work at Rush Presbyterian Hospital in Chicago, and to his son, Kamau, 2 1/2, who is teaching him to be a good parent.
Kimathi said he is trying to do a good job, making sure Kamau gets all that he needs, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and that he has a role model to follow all his days.