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Donna Kim, a graduating member of ROTC, will be stationed in Korea.

Of more than 4,000 female students who plan to walk across the stage at commencement this spring, a handful have chosen to enter a field that has traditionally been male-dominated.

Donna Kim, a fifth-year Asian humanities student, is one of those few.

A member of the Army Reserve Officers’ Training Corps at UCLA for two years and an enlisted soldier in the Army National Guard for the past five years, Kim will be commissioned as a second lieutenant, the lowest army officer rank, upon graduation.

In six months, she expects to be on active duty as a field artillery officer in Korea, where she will lead and control field artillery troops and combined armed forces during land combat.

Kim said it was her first choice to be stationed in Korea because she was born there and will be able to visit relatives she has not seen since coming to the U.S. at the age of 10.

Women can serve in every branch of the military except the infantry and armor branches, which are essentially frontline soldiers, because it is more difficult to achieve gender integration in those branches, said Thomas Higginson, army captain and assistant professor of military science.

“Just the nature in which they are built, the closeness, the living conditions – it’s difficult to accommodate both genders,” he said. “There are no walls; there are no stalls.”

Tamara DeJesus, a second-year history student in Army ROTC, said she understands that because they are physically different from men, women are not allowed to become involved in certain fields of the military.

“A lot of females still want to get there, but in actuality, it’s really difficult,” she said. “We’re built differently for combat and we have different needs.”

Higginson said Kim’s situation is unique because not many women go into her field of the military.

“She is kind of breaking ground there,” Higginson said.

Higginson said it is common for women going into the military to become medical service officers, military police and engineers. Many women often fill support roles in the special forces and military intelligence.

Though Kim said the field she plans to enter is more male-dominated than others, so far she has not felt many negative effects of the gender divide during her time in the military.

“They don’t separate (women). They don’t say, ‘You can’t do this.’ It’s always been very equal,” she said.

Despite being a minority in the military, women should not be deterred from enlisting, Kim said.

“I think a lot of females have the idea that ‘I’m a girl; I don’t see myself doing that,’” she said. “It’s all in your head. If you put your mind to it, you can do it.”

Still, her career path has not always proved easy. She said she typically wakes up at 5 a.m. to do physical training and attend a military science class, in addition to other classes during the day. Many of her weekends consist of field-training exercises and training in land navigations, where she learns how to navigate with a compass and a map.

“It’s time-consuming, but it’s all worth it,” she said.

Kim said after she completes her required service, she is not sure whether she will pursue a career with the military. She said she plans to go into a communications job dealing with radios and satellites, and may also consider going into a career offered by the Army, such as military intelligence.

In either case, she said she expects that her ROTC and Army experience will be beneficial.

“If I don’t decide to (have a military career) in 20 years, I’ll use what I learned in the Army and apply it to my civilian life,” she said.

Kim has taken on leadership roles in ROTC and has completed basic training. As ROTC battalion commander, she oversaw the ROTC programs at UCLA and California State University, Northridge.

“My impression of her is that she wants to make a contribution,” Higginson said. “She loves the country and she probably feels it’s her turn to give back.”

Kim said though she knows there may be more obstacles to deal with, she is looking forward to her career.

“I mean who gets to shoot a weapon? Who gets to go and throw a grenade? You don’t do that in everyday life. The military is about gaining experience. It’s a learning process, a growing process,” she said.