Thirteen SESP students have won fellowships for study, community projects and research in 2008-09. These include the seniors honored at Northwestern University's Honors Day on June 19. Following are descriptions of their fellowship projects: |
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An honors senior in Social Policy, Priya Fielding-Singh won a DAAD Study Scholarship for research and study in Germany. She will carry out an independent study while pursuing a master's degree in education at the University of Bremen. Her research will explore the experiences of Muslim women in higher education and the relationship between these experiences and the negotiation of their identities. "I will conduct interviews with Muslim women enrolled at the University of Bremen, which help me to understand how university involvement reflects family values, allows for movements in cultural expectations, impacts professional aspirations and provides personal resources that facilitate changes in self concept," she says. |
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Keenya Hofmaier, who won the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, is studying abroad in South Africa through the Northwestern Public Health Program. She has done practical work in different health clinics and community organizations dealing with HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, poverty, alcohol abuse and rehabilitation. "I have found an interest in sexual health-in dealing with abuse, cultural norms and the media," she says. When she returns, her service project will be to create a student-organized seminar for winter 2009 on one of the issues. "My experience has been invaluable and has truly opened my mind much more than I ever thought it would," says Hofmaier. |
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Melanie Kahl and Molly Day were selected as Northwestern University Public Interest Fellows. The NU-PIP program is a one-year fellowship program that places graduating Northwestern seniors in public interest jobs throughout the Chicago area. NU-PIP is designed to introduce young alumni to organizations whose missions are to create systemic social change as well as to enable these organizations to capitalize on the fellows' experience, intelligence and work ethic. Day (at left) is the co-founder and director of campusCatalyst, a nonprofit organization that directs college students as future leaders in business and community development. Kahl will work with Chicago Public Schools in the Office for New Schools. |
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Christine Leung of the Master of Science in Learning and Organizational Change (MSLOC) program won an Education Pioneers Fellowship to work at the headquarters of CityYear service corps in Boston this summer. Working with the director of evaluation and director of service, she will determine accessibility of student-level data in school districts where CityYear operates across the country. "My main deliverable at the end of the summer will be to propose a strategy to use the data for performance measurement of CityYear's Whole School, Whole Child service model to improve the organization's national programming," she says. |
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Learning Sciences doctoral student Camillia Matuk was awarded two fellowships, a Northwestern Cognitive Science Graduate Fellowship and a fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). They will support her study of how people understand evolution from visual representations. "There are a number of subtle interactions that underlie how this occurs," she says. "In my research, I attempt to describe how these various factors interact in the creation of meaning and how features of visual representations influence people's interpretations of evolution." |
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Learning Sciences doctoral student Enid Rosario-Ramos won a National Academy of Education Predoctoral Fellowship in Adolescent Literacy after a rigorous national competition. This highly selective fellowship is a new initiative by the National Academy of Education and the Carnegie Foundation of New York to encourage a new generation of scholars in the field of adolescent literacy. Rosario-Ramos's project will explore the relationships between adolescents' participation in community building and the development of critical literacy skills. |
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Senior Claire Ryan won a Fulbright fellowship for 2008-09. With the French Government Teaching Assistantship she will teach English in France. Ryan, a social policy major, is an honors student whose research project focused on environmental education. | ||
| Juniors Samuel Schiller and Nikolai Smith were selected as Udall Scholars for their commitment to the environment. They were among 80 students selected from among 510 candidates nominated by 239 colleges. Schiller also won a Young People For fellowship for leadership in social justice work. | ||||
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Casey Shea won an El Pomar Fellowship for leadership training. She says, "I am thrilled to join the 2008 El Pomar Fellowship Class and to contribute to the work of the El Pomar Foundation over the next two years. Having spent a summer as an El Pomar intern, I am impressed by and eager to be further involved in El Pomar's collaborative work in communities across Colorado." As part of the 2008 fellowship class, Shea will operate the Foundation's community stewardship programs, conduct outreach intiative, and contribute to the Foundation's grantmaking. She will also perform research based on my interest in Education Policy and the Foundation's interest to meet the changing needs of Colorado. |
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Recent graduate Amanda Dixon won a 2008-09 Rotary Foundation Academic-Year Ambassadorial Scholarship. In January, she will begin study at la Universidad Andina de Simon Bolivar in Sucre, Bolivia, where she will take master's-level classes with an emphasis on indigenous human rights and sustainable development. In addition, she will become involved in the Rotary Club in Sucre, where she will work on community service projects, and she also hopes to work with a community organization in Sucre. "While the scholarship does have an academic component, the most important component is my immersion and involvement in the community in which I am placed. I could not be more excited for the opportunity to live in Bolivia for over a year, and I fully intend to take advantage of every opportunity that this scholarship has provided," she says. |
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Whitney Eulich, another recent graduate, also won a 2008-09 Rotary Foundation Academic-Year Ambassadorial Scholarship. She plans to spend six months in Merida, Venezuela, starting in January 2009. She will study Spanish and volunteer with a local land-use/communications organization and live with a local host family. "I'm really looking forward to the challenges of learning a new language and immersing myself in the Venezuelan culture. I'm also looking forward to sharing my experiences with friends and family back home--dispelling some of the stereotypes about the country and better understanding the political climate," she says. Currently Eulich is working as a consultant to FEMA in New Orleans, but prior to departing for Venezuela she will leave her job to pursue a three-month course in documentary radio production at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in Portland, Maine. She hopes to communicate the information and experiences I encounter abroad through radio stories and programming. |
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Last Modified: 8/14/09