Galia Porat graduated from Cheltenham High School in Wyncote, PA. in 2001. Now in 2005 she has graduated from ILR with honors and at the top of her class. Galia has been accepted by the University of Pennsylvania Law School. She is in the process of deferring admission for one year. She will stay at ILR and complete her Master's Degree in Organizational Behavior.

Q. What will you do with a Master's Degree in Organizational Behavior and a Degree in Law?
A. Eventually, I want to be a Federal Judge. In the meantime, I want to work in public policy and hopefully, when I graduate from Law School, I can be an Assistant District Attorney. Organizational Behavior is a very good principle for learning about sociology and psychology behind organizations and it's applicable in every aspect of life. But, right now I'm keeping my options open for the future and I know that a Master's will be able to give me more skills and let me continue my research for another year and hopefully, be applicable in Law School and in my work later on.

Q. As an assistant District Attorney, what do you anticipate you will be doing and what can you learn from that experience?
A. Ideally it would be doing criminal litigation for about two to three years. I'm from Philadelphia and I would like to stay in Philadelphia. I understand that organizations are driven — not necessarily by individual actors but also by their own personality and by the sociological and psychological forces that exist.  And, that gives you a very good understanding of how organizations work and whether they are efficient or not efficient.  I'm really confident that a master's degree in Organizational Behavior and degree in Law will be able to help me in the future.

Q. What's the best class you have taken at ILR?
A. I've taken a lot of very good classes but I think a class is not just good because of the course material. I think a good class is one that teaches you personal skills — a work ethic, it challenges you and tests you to the limits of your understanding. In terms of those things, the best class I've taken at ILR is Labor Law 201 — with Professor Michael Gold. It's almost an infamous class in ILR. Everybody has to take it and there are several professors you can take it with. Professor Gold is infamously known for it being the hardest or one of the hardest classes in ILR. People try to shy away from it. I was quote "stuck" with taking that class and I was very fearful and I worked harder in that class than probably any other class that I have taken in ILR or in the University before and since. But, I was challenged and ended up learning a lot and established a work ethic. I was able to be a Teaching Assistant for that class in my junior and senior year. As a result, I've been able to really see from being in it and also see from him teaching it. It really does what a class should do that a lot of other classes don't.

Q. Best teacher?
A. Professor Gold is a very good teacher because he understands how students need to be challenged and that there should be different things involved and not just regurgitate the material. He is incredibly intelligent. I think Professors Clete Daniel, George Boyer and Lowell Turner are also very good teachers who are passionate about what they teach. I think that is very important because students don't want to care if the Professors don't care about what they are teaching. They are some of the best teachers that I have had.

Q. How have you changed in your four years at the ILR School?
A. I've changed a lot. Every year has been a different change. Aside from the academic skills, I think I've matured from where I was in high school by leaps and bounds. And I've gained a much better perspective into what I want to do. I think I have become a lot less selfish. College is conducive to making you think that the world revolves around you and you really have to see outside of yourself to become less selfish and understand your part of a network of people. Just the opportunity to be involved in research and be involved in a lot student groups and meet people from all over the world and do a lot of different things. I've matured a lot and became the person that I am that I wasn't when I came here four years ago.

Q. Do ILR Students have common traits?
A. Absolutely. People say that ILR students are two different breeds. There are people that happen to be in ILR and aren't really friends with a lot of ILR people. And there are people that who are friends with a lot of ILR people. I'm definitely in the second cohort. I love my ILR friends. I think that ILR students—actually, I'm sure, are the some of the most driven people on this campus. For the second smallest college at Cornell and having a very small student population, ILR has some of the most active and involved leaders on campus and some of the most passionate and driven people I have met. They know what the want to do and know how to get there and they get it done. ILR students are some of the leaders on campus in every facet. They always have an abnormal majority in the student assembly, scholarships, athleticism, different programs on campus. I think this is great because they bring a name and a reputation to ILR. They don't take themselves over seriously and they know how to have a good time.

Q. Did ILR meet up with your expectations?
A. I think coming into it, I didn't realize how structured the program would actually be. It was a little off putting at first but I have really come to appreciate how structured it is. It was structured in a beneficial way—in a way that students can benefit from it. It definitely met my expectations in terms of it being small and being able to get to know your professors and to get to know your fellow students. I chose ILR because it is a small community within a large school. I knew it would be a place where we looked at labor-management issues and whether you end up being pro labor or pro management — or walk in being pre law and walk out doing human resources or whatever you do, you have the option to do all those things. Not everybody in ILR is pre law but a lot of students come in pre law and then go to law school.

Q. What will you miss?
A. First and foremost, I am going to miss a lot of my really good friends in ILR—seeing them on a daily basis, running into them in the library, seeing them in classes. I'm going to miss the small classes, some of the course material — a lot of the collective bargaining and the organizational behavior material. I'm going to miss my research mentor, Professor Bill Sonnenstuhl. I'm going to miss being a teaching assistant for Professor Michael Gold and Professor Sonnenstuhl. It's hard because ILR is connected to my greater image of Cornell. It's a great school with a very good undergraduate education. I'm going to miss it a lot. The thing that is great about ILR is that it is adaptive. It's an adaptive college in the sense that by the time you are a junior and senior, you're taking the classes you want to take — you're doing what you want to be doing.  ILR can form a little bit of a bubble and it can be very competitive at times if you let yourself get trapped into that kind of situation. I let myself fall into that trap sometimes. I won't miss that at times because I think it can be stressful.

Q. Were you surprised when you won the James Campbell Award that is given to students who best represent the qualities of character personality exemplified by Professor Campbell?
A. I was really flattered and I was really happy that I was nominated by the Student Services Office and by a faculty committee. I understand the qualities of academic excellence and service to the school. But, I was a little surprised by the humility and friendliness part to it because — I think I'm friendly — but I've been known not to be. I think I'm kind of humble. I've also been known as not to be. I was happy that some people recognized those traits in me.

Q. You are a member of the Cornell Presidential Research Scholars Program. What did you do as a Research Scholar?
A. Cornell awards this scholarship from the applicant pool of the Freshman Class. I have been doing research since my freshman year. The first year I researched for Professor Lowell Turner and looked at labor - management partnerships. I found that after two years, you are either very interested in labor and labor relations and labor law or you're not. As I have progressed, I have been more interested in organizational behavior principles than labor per se. I began to work with Professor Bill Sonnenstuhl in my sophomore year and I worked with him through my senior year. I've been doing research with him on alcohol and drug interventions, specifically on college campuses and also writing papers. My research evolved into my Senior Honors Thesis. The research scholarship has allowed me to do fully funded research — do research over the summer, half in Ithaca and half in Washington, D.C. I would not have been able to do it without the Presidential Research Scholarship nor would I have had the incentive to do it. The defining experience for me at Cornell is my research through the Presidential Research Scholarship.

Q. How do you fit in all of your activities?
A. It's hard. It really culminated a lot this year. Being a senior, you think you have time management under control. You think you know it. It can be done. I think people get too complacent. It can be very stressful but I thrive on stress, I think. I'm in a student group on campus — Quill and Dagger — Senior Honor Society. It is made up of a lot of student leaders. I've been incredibly inspired by everybody in that group because they are student leaders from all over campus. I've never seen in my life, a group of more dedicated, busy, hard working people who find the time to do everything I do and about ten times more. So, I know that I can always be doing more and manage things and be concerned with people outside of my own interests.

- Interview by Robert Julian