Whitman Students & Grads Awarded Prestigious Fellowships & Opportunities

A wide array of opportunities will take Whitties to locations across the U.S. and abroad.

With the guidance of the Fellowships and Grants team in the Career and Community Engagement Center, Whitman College students and alumni are awarded many grants, fellowships and scholarships each year to continue their education and service beyond our campus.

In the last 15 years, more than 500 Whitman students have earned prestigious fellowships and grants. This year was no different, with over a dozen successful applicants who excelled in the areas of academic achievement, leadership and community engagement/service.

Below we highlight the students and alumni who were fellowship or grant recipients in the 2023–2024 academic year.

Research

James C. Gaither Junior Fellows Program

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace generates strategic ideas and independent analysis to help countries and institutions take on the most difficult global problems and advance peace. Its James C. Gaither Junior Fellows Program offers approximately 15 one-year fellowships to uniquely qualified graduating seniors and individuals who have graduated during the past academic year. Junior fellows work as research assistants to Carnegie’s senior scholars.

Sueli Gwiazdowski ’24 (Carnegie Nuclear Policy Program)

Research Experiences for Undergraduates

Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REUs) sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and other organizations, as well as Summer Undergraduate Research Programs (SURPs) and Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURFs), are competitive summer research programs for undergraduate students interested in STEM-focused fields. Each student is associated with a specific research project and works closely with the faculty and other researchers.

Henry Anderson ’27 (NSF REU, Ecohydrology of Tropical Montane Forests Program, Texas A&M University, Costa Rica)
Marleigh Anderson ’24 (Data+ REU, Rhodes Information Initiative, Duke University)
Kenzie Bay ’25 (SURP, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center)
Emily De La Cruz Hofer ’26 (NSF REU, Helen Hawkes Thompson Student Research Grant, Friday Harbor Laboratories, University of Washington)
Francisco Elia-Benfield ’25 (NSF REU, Helen Hawkes Thompson Student Research Grant, Friday Harbor Laboratories, University of Washington)
Alex Hynes ’26 (NSF REU, Hobart and William Smith Colleges and Plymouth State University)
Abedalrahman Jomaa ’25 (SURF, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science)
Noelle Mattingley ’25 (NSF REU, Center for Neurotechnology Program, University of Washington)
Ella Schneider ’25 (SURP, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center)
Chase Schubert ‘26 (NSF REU, Dauphin Island Sea Lab)
Maddie Sramek ’25 (SURF, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science)
Sebastian Wiedenhoeft ’27 (NSF REU, Socially Relevant Computing and Analytics Program, North Carolina State University)

Research Internships in Science and Engineering (RISE)

Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) German Academic Exchange Service is the world’s largest funding organization for the international exchange of students and researchers. Since it was founded in 1925, around 2.9 million scholars in Germany and abroad have received DAAD funding. DAAD supports RISE Germany, which allows undergraduate students to complete summer research internships at top German universities and research institutions, and RISE Professional, which offers summer research internships at companies and nonuniversity research institutions with strong connections to industry.

Grace Remmert ’25 (RISE Germany)
Ben Wendlandt ’24 (RISE Professional)

Service & Leadership

Newman Civic Fellowship

The Newman Civic Fellowship is a yearlong program that recognizes and supports student problem solvers at Campus Compact member institutions. Fellows are nominated by their president or chancellor based on their potential for public leadership and their work with communities. Throughout the fellowship year, Campus Compact provides students with opportunities to nurture their assets and help them develop strategies for social change—creating a network of connected and engaged student leaders who can support one another in making positive change.

Adam Simon ’26

Projects for Peace Award

Projects for Peace is a global program that partners with educational institutions to identify and support young peacebuilders. Each year, 125 or more student learners are granted $10,000 each to develop innovative, community-centered and scalable responses to the world’s most pressing issues. Recipients implement a Project for Peace typically between May and August.

Maryanne Ndung’u ’26 (Jua Financial Empowerment Initiative, Kenya)

Public Policy & International Affairs

The Public Policy & International Affairs Program is hosted at top graduate policy schools in the country. These rigorous summer programs prepare students for advanced education and success in the field of public service.

Meron Semere ’25 (Heinz College at Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania)
Kate Moe '25 (Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan)

Study

Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship

The Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship program was created to encourage outstanding sophomores and juniors to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences or engineering and to foster excellence in those fields. It is one of the oldest and most prestigious national scholarships in the natural sciences, engineering and mathematics.

Eliza Daigle ’25 (Life Sciences)
Kaleo Toguchi-Tani ’25 (Physics and Astronomy)

Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship Program

The U.S. Department of State’s Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship Program provides students of limited financial means opportunities to study or intern abroad, enabling them to gain proficiency in diverse languages and skills that are critical to our national security and economic prosperity and encourages them to conduct STEM-related research.

Isabel Arcaris ’26 (Panama)
Joseph Shepard DeGraw ’25 (Tropical Island Biodiversity Studies, Panama)
Agustin Ramirez ’25 (Film Studies, Czech Republic)
Ashtin Gray Sampson ’25 (Tokyo Arts and Sciences, Japan)

Erasmus Mundus Joint Master’s Program Scholarship

The Erasmus Mundus Joint Master’s Degree is an international study program offered by a consortium of institutions of higher education. The scholarship is awarded to high-achieving students for programs of 12–24 months in duration and taking place in at least two countries.

Marharyta Tkachenka ’24 (emPLANT Program)

Teaching

Fulbright U.S. Student Program

Fulbright grants support individually designed study/research projects, arts projects (all disciplines) or English teaching assistantships, almost always in a single country. The Fulbright U.S. Student Program facilitates cultural exchange, allowing each grantee to gain an appreciation of others’ viewpoints, beliefs, practices and ideas. To date, over 100 Whitman students and alumni have received a Fulbright Award.

Jade Strapart ’23 (English Teaching Assistant Award, Germany)

Japan Exchange and Teaching Program

The Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program fosters internationalization in Japan by promoting mutaul understanding between the people of Japan and those of other countries. JET program participants serve in local authorities and in public and private elementary, junior and senior high schools in Japan.

Irene Tsai ’24

North American Language and Culture Assistants Program

The North American Language and Culture Assistants Program (NALCAP) sends more than 2,000 American and Canadian participants to Spain each year to serve as language teaching assistants, sharing their native knowledge of the English or French language and North American culture in Spanish public K–12 schools.

Leila Baker ’24
Naima Corea ’24
Lily Yost ’24

Princeton in Latin America

The Princeton in Latin America program places highly qualified recent college graduates in yearlong service fellowships with nonprofit, public service, humanitarian, and government organizations in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Katherine Swisher ’20 (Dream Project, Dominican Republic)

Explore Opportunities

For more information about fellowship and grant opportunities and how the application process works, contact Jess Hernandez, Director for Fellowships and Grants, or Jenny Stratton, Administrative Assistant for Fellowships and Grants.