2017 Regional, National and International Awards

More than 30 Pitzer College students and graduates won fellowships, scholarships and awards during the 2016-17 academic year. Here is an overview of Pitzer’s outstanding scholars and the awards they received to support research projects, language learning and academic programs around the world. Fulbright Fellowship winners are listed here.

American Sociological Association Honors Program

Adriana Ceron '18, American Sociological Association Honors ProgramAdriana Ceron ’18 was accepted to the American Sociological Association Honors Program for exceptional sociology students. The program introduces undergraduate sociology students to the professional life of the discipline and encourages them to develop long-lasting networks with other aspiring sociologists. In 2016, Ceron earned a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship, an initiative of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation designed to increase faculty diversity by supporting outstanding underrepresented students who plan to pursue careers in academia. A sociology major and Chicano/a-Latino/a studies minor, Ceron is an intern with Pitzer’s Office of Admission’s Preview Pitzer Program.

Coro Fellowship in Public Affairs

Chance Kawar '17, Coro Fellowship in Public AffairsChance Kawar ’17, a political studies major and Spanish minor, was selected as a Coro Fellow in Public Affairs in Los Angeles, where he will participate in a nine-month, graduate-level experiential leadership training program. At Pitzer, Kawar took on numerous leadership roles, including serving for seven semesters in the Student Senate, most recently as the senior class president. He was also chairman of Pitzer Activities, as well as a founding member of the Middle Eastern Student Association. He has interned for both regional and national political leaders, including US Senator Dianne Feinstein and Congresswoman Susan Davis. He also studied abroad on the Pitzer in Ecuador program. Kawar ultimately plans to pursue a graduate degree in public policy or administration, and ultimately work in the public or nonprofit sector.

Jennifer Lesorogol '17, Coro Fellowship in Public AffairsJennifer Lesorogol ’17, an environmental analysis and international and intercultural studies double major, was awarded a Coro Fellowship to Los Angeles. At Pitzer, Lesorogol was active in many facets of campus life, including serving as an admission fellow, a research assistant, a student senator and a student field group representative. She also interned with Global Green USA’s Green Urbanism Program. Her long-term career goals include working with an environmental think tank or an NGO dedicated to addressing climate change. The Coro Fellowship will help Lesorogol fulfill these goals through hands-on training experiences as an activist, advocate and policy maker.

Davis Projects for Peace

Brendan Schultz '20, Davis Projects for PeaceBrendan Schultz ’20, a politics, philosophy and sociology major, was awarded $10,000 from Davis Projects for Peace for his project “Bridging Backgrounds: A Macedonian Inter-Ethnic Conference for Cultivating Mutual Understanding and Tolerance.” Schultz will organize a youth conference this July in Macedonia that will be the first to include participants from all the ethnicities present in the country with the goal of creating a community in order to reach a common, high level of understanding of human rights and hate speech. During his senior year in high school, he served as a United States Youth Ambassador to Macedonia on a youth cultural exchange scholarship.

Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship

Lillian Horin '17, National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships and Ford Foundation Predoctoral FellowshipLillian Horin ’17, a biology major, received a Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship to pursue her PhD at Harvard University, where she plans to study the relationship between metabolic dysregulation and (epi)genetic regulation.  Horin was also awarded a 2017 National Science Foundation Fellowship.

Alfredo "Freddy" Valencia '14, National Institutes of Health and Ford Foundation Predoctoral FellowshipsAlfredo “Freddy” Valencia ’14, a biochemistry major, was awarded a Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship to complete his PhD in chemical biology at Harvard University. His research focuses on the biochemical and epigenetic underpinnings of highly aggressive cancers.

Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship

Victoria Hernandez '18, Benjamin A. Gilman International ScholarshipVictoria Hernandez ’18, an art history major, was awarded a Gilman Scholarship for study abroad in the International Student Exchange Program at Tilburg University in the Netherlands during spring 2017.

International Writing Centers Association Scholarship

Jordan Jenkins '17, Fulbright FellowshipJordan Jenkins ’17 won a 2016 President’s Future Leaders Scholarship from the International Writing Centers Association. Jenkins, who became a Pitzer College Writing Center fellow her sophomore year, was one of only four writing tutors nationwide—and the only undergraduate in the country—to receive the scholarship, which is awarded to peer tutors who are proven leaders at their colleges’ writing centers. Jenkins also won a 2017-18 Student Program Fulbright to teach English in Spain.

Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship

Victor Bene ’19, an Africana studies and environmental analysis major, was awarded a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. Bene’s research will focus on crafting the first historiography of best practices of survival within House and Ball Culture from 1980 to 1990 in New York City. They plan to utilize an interdisciplinary approach to understand transgender black and brown subjects in their totality.

Kevin Kandamby '19, Mellon Mays Undergraduate FellowshipKevin Kandamby ’19, a Chicano/a-Latino/a transnational studies major and mathematics minor, was awarded a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. He will research the retention rates of first-generation Latina/o students enrolled in STEM programs at predominately white higher education institutions and examine how these institutions can better retain underrepresented students.

Javier LopezCasetano '19, Mellon Mays Undergraduate FellowshipJavier LopezCasertano ’19, an international/intercultural studies and Spanish major, will use his Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship to conduct a qualitative ethnographic investigation that analyzes how Mayan indigenous actors in the central highlands of Guatemala are implementing bilingual, intercultural education by focusing on the historical narratives of the Guatemalan civil war.

Naima OrozcoValdivia ’19, a history major and theater minor, was awarded a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. OrozcoValdivia will conduct an oral history on Plaza de La Raza, a community arts organization and school located in Lincoln Heights, CA, with the goal of identifying the organization’s role as a center for arts and education as well as placing it within the historical context of the Chicano movement in Los Angeles.

Jasmine "Jazzy" Randle '19, Mellon Mays Undergraduate FellowshipJasmine (Jazzy) Randle ’19, an environmental analysis and sociology major, was awarded a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. Randle will analyze the relationship between social cohesion, social dialogue and social capital in a community garden in Los Angeles, aiming to discern if and how community gardening deconstructs social barriers.

Napier Awards for Creative Leadership

Tiffany Ortamond '17, Napier Award for Creative LeadershipTiffany Ortamond ’17, an environmental analysis major, was awarded a $15,000 Napier Award for Creative Leadership, which promotes social justice, care of the earth and global peace. She plans to use the award to work with the Tla’amin First Nations tribe in British Columbia to create and implement a water quality testing/education program and contribute to an ongoing database for water analysis. She intends to build a foundation to empower local tribal members and others to collect and log information that can be utilized in building legitimate cases addressing pollution, international development and environmental justice.

Eli Erlick '17, Napier Awards for Creative Leadership AlternateEli Erlick ’17, a feminist, gender, sexuality studies major and sociology minor, was selected as an alternate for the Napier award. Her project proposed to support the Trans Youth Leadership Summit, a unique and innovative Los Angeles-based fellowship program designed to develop the activism and organizing skills of young transgender leaders across the country.

Nick Flores '17, Napier Awards for Creative Leadership FellowNick Necochea Flores ’17, a sociology major, was named a 2017 Napier Fellow. A New Resources student and mentor at Pitzer, he served on Pitzer Activities (PAct) as well as the Student Senate Judicial Council. He won a 2017 Campus Impact Award from the Student Senate and a Pitzer Student Leadership Award.

National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships

Brian Cohen '15, National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research FellowshipsBrian Cohn ’15, a computational biology major, was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship that will support his research in computer science at USC, where he is currently pursuing a PhD. Cohn’s research focuses on how musculoskeletal control works across health and disease. Designing models, building prototypes and conducting dissections are all part of the scientific work he uses to help understand neuromuscular phenomena.

Kristin Dobbins '13, National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research FellowshipsKristin Dobbin ’13, an environmental analysis major, is the recipient of an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship that will support her graduate research on the role of special drinking water districts in California water management and water justice. Dobbin served as the regional water management coordinator at Community Water Center, where she worked with unincorporated disadvantaged communities in the Central Valley of California to promote the human right to water. She plans to undertake graduate studies at University of California, Davis.

Lillian Horin '17, National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships and Ford Foundation Predoctoral FellowshipLillian Horin ’17, a biology major, received an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship to help fund her research in graduate school at Harvard University, where she plans to study the relationship between metabolic dysregulation and (epi)genetic regulation. Horin is a first-generation college student from Los Angeles who served as a resident assistant and Writing Center fellow during her time at Pitzer. She also won a 2017 Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship.

Samuel "Yoni" Rubin '15, National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research FellowshipsSamuel “Yoni” Rubin ’15, a physics and molecular biology double major with a minor in chemistry, received an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. He is currently a PhD candidate in the Immunology Program at Stanford University, where his research focuses on cell signaling mechanisms associated with the regulation of self-tolerance, as well as design of novel molecular tools to study these pathways.

National Institutes of Health Fellowship

Alfredo "Freddy" Valencia '14, National Institutes of Health and Ford Foundation Predoctoral FellowshipsAlfredo “Freddy” Valencia ’14, who majored in biochemistry at Pitzer and is pursuing his PhD in chemical biology at Harvard University, was awarded a National Institutes of Health Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award Individual Predoctoral Fellowship to Promote Diversity in Health-Related Research. Recipients of this NIH fellowship are mentored by experts in their fields while they conduct dissertation research. The fellowship, which enhances health-related workforce diversity, is awarded to support promising predoctoral students training to become productive, independent research scientists. Valencia’s current research focuses on the biochemical and epigenetic underpinnings of highly aggressive cancers.

Princeton in Latin America

Roberto Figueroa '17, Princeton in Latin AmericaRoberto Figueroa ’17 was awarded a year-long fellowship with Princeton in Latin America (PiLA). PiLA matches partner organizations engaged in socially responsible development projects in Latin America and the Caribbean with highly qualified and motivated recent college graduates. A political science major and Spanish minor, Figueroa will work with Endeavor, an NGO in Santiago, Chile, that supports successful startups and companies in Latin America. At Pitzer, Figueroa served on the Pitzer College Judicial Council as well as the Senior Class Council. He has worked at Morgan Stanley as a sales and trading summer analyst and as a Congressional Intern at the US House of Representatives.

Public Policy & International Affairs Program (PPIA) Fellowship

Sydney Warren '18, Public Policy & International Affairs (PPIA) FellowshipSydney Warren ’18, an international political economics major/Chinese minor, was awarded a Public Policy & International Affairs Program (PPIA) summer fellowship. In summer 2017, Warren participated in an intensive seven-week academic program at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. This program prepares undergraduates to be competitive candidates for top degree programs in the fields of public policy, public administration or international affairs. The fellowship includes a $1,500 stipend for the summer program as well as a $5,000 scholarship at a PPIA graduate school.

Teachers for Vietnam 

Sache Watsache '17, Teachers for VietnamSachi Watase ’17 was selected by Teachers for Vietnam (TfV) to teach English at a university in the Mekong Delta. TfV is a nonprofit dedicated to building bridges between Vietnamese and Americans through cultural exchange and university-level language learning. Each year, the program selects four to six teachers certified in Teaching English as a Second Language to hold courses in universities in southwestern Vietnam. A studio art major and mathematics minor, Watase helped found Pitzer Advocates for Survivors of Sexual Assault and Pitzer’s Mixed Identity Exchange, an affinity group for students who identify as multiracial, multiethnic or multicultural. She won the Pitzer College Student Senate’s 2017 Campus Impact Award.