Data Justice

This year, College Park Scholars and the City of College Park celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Lakeland STARs program with Paint Branch Elementary School. Lakeland STARs tutors work with first to sixth grade students from nearby Paint Branch Elementary to enrich their academic experiences. Scholars are matched one-on-one with a PBES student and meet each week on a designated day throughout the semester. The 20th anniversary celebration on April 25 honored the legacy and the future of the program. “It was an incredibly heartwarming event. I was very happy to see the program receiving appreciation from the city and from the College Park mayor,” senior Science and Global Change Scholar and STARs Student Coordinator Aastha Kaul said.

Scholars students came out in full force for the Climate Action 2016 forum and summit on campus and in DC from May 4-6. The three day-long events focused on climate change and sustainability, looking at how to turn a problem into an opportunity for change. Eight current Scholars found their niche interning with Climate Action 2016 through the Public Leadership (PL) and Environment, Technology and Economy (ETE) programs. “James [Stillwell] offered PL students the option to intern with him this spring, and myself as well as a few of my peers jumped at the opportunity,” freshman PL Scholar and psychology major Pamela Kekst said.

With graduation only weeks away, senior biological sciences major Sarahann Yeh’s future looks even brighter since being awarded the 2016-17 Fulbright U.S. Student Grant. The Life Sciences alumna will use her award to teach English in Indonesia, assisting local English teachers. Yeh said that Scholars gave her the springboard she needed to get involved on campus. “Scholars enabled me to hit the ground running when I came to Maryland,” Yeh said. While in Indonesia, Yeh will also serve as a U.S. cultural ambassador while she volunteers, and she credits Scholars for helping her discover her excitement for cultural advocacy.

As a former Arts Scholars and past winner of the Martha and Ira Berlin Legacy Fund Scholarship, senior Emily Tuttle’s Scholars experience is even more meaningful since her scholarship win. Earning the scholarship provided Tuttle with the opportunity to study abroad in Ireland in a creative writing immersion class through the Department of Arts and Humanities. “This award supports students who have a well-defined, innovative project, who are committed to Scholars and to learning from diversity, and who have financial need,” Scholars Executive Director Dr. Marilee Lindemann said.

On March 31, the Cambridge Community will host the first-ever Me Too Monologues on the College Park campus. Me Too Monologues is a documentary theater performance about identity and all the issues that surround it. Students and faculty have been asked to anonymously submit stories about their experiences, and peers will perform their stories as monologues in a theatrical production. This is a national production that has been performed at colleges all over the country. Sophomore Life Sciences Scholar Maryam Ghaderi decided to propose that Scholars host this event after hearing about the Me Too Monologues from friends.

On Feb. 19, a group of seven College Park Scholars presented in the Samuel Riggs IV Alumni Center for the first-ever ScholarsNEXT event. ScholarsNEXT is a student-run event that provides students with an opportunity to share their ideas about solving real-world problems. Presenters had to register for a class, which met every other week for an hour. Sponsored by the UMD SGA and the Office of Undergraduate Studies, Ananth Srivatsan was able to make his dream a reality in founding this event. “These students are incredibly talented, and they have some, frankly, brilliant ideas,” Srivatsan, a Science, Technology and Society Scholar, said before introducing the first speaker, Public Leadership Scholar Aaron Pludwinski.