Past Lang Social Impact Fellow Profiles

• Hussain Zaidi '22 - During and following their Lang Project, Zaidi has published extensively in the field of sexual and gender minority healthcare across different global contexts. They have worked with the Gates Medical Research Institute, MATCH-Research Institute, and the University of Washington to design and implement various public health and research initiatives dedicated towards centering SGM-people in broader academic and structural discourse. Pivoting towards art-making as a medium to uplift and advocate for marginalized voices -- with the support of the LSIF grant -- they are now working to scale a coalition of activists and artists making a specialized effort to expand queer/trans centered media in Pakistan. This will be the focus of their fellowship year.
• Tristan Alston '22 graduated from Swarthmore College with highest honors, majoring in Peace and Conflict Studies and minoring in both Black and Environmental Studies. While at Swarthmore, Tristan was a Lang Scholar during which time he created the Berkshire Equity Research Collaborative (BERC)—a youth-centered participatory action research project aimed at understanding and addressing racial inequity within white-majority school districts in Western Massachusetts. BERC was Tristan's focus during the fellowship year.
• Raven Bennett '17 graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Swarthmore College and received High Honors with a major in psychology and a minor in educational studies. During her time at Swarthmore, Raven engaged in social activism efforts to prevent sexual violence.  She was an inaugural member of the Swarthmore College Title IX Student Advisory Team and Title IX Liaison Team. As a Lang Scholar, she created the Youth Activist Institute and the Fraternity Mentorship Program. Both initiatives were designed to prevent sexual violence by empowering participants to be activists. In her fellowship year, Raven will be replicating the Fraternity Mentorship Program, a sexual violence prevention program designed to capitalize on the strength of male peer relationships in fraternities in order to create positive culture change, at other US colleges and universities. Raven will also develop a business model to create sustainable infrastructure to support continued dissemination of the Fraternity Mentorship Program.
• Fatima Boozarjomehri '18 graduated from Swarthmore College with majors in Peace and Conflict Studies and Islamic Studies. As a student at Swarthmore College, Fatima worked with vulnerable populations in Southern Tehran and designed projects dedicated to improving access to education and training for youth and women through two separate initiatives: The Fanoos Project (sponsored in part by the Project Pericles Fund of Swarthmore College) and ReVision (her Lang Scholar project). During the Fellowship, Fatima expanded the scope of The Fanoos Project, a vocational training program for single mothers and focus on developing a sustainable business model. 
• Rebecca Castillo '20 A special major in Education, Race, and Media Studies, Rebecca grew up with a passion for storytelling and a severe lack of Latina representation in media. This, along with her observations of barriers to education and unequal distribution of academic resources, inspired her to launch Storyboard. With funding from the Project Pericles Fund of Swarthmore College, Storyboard provided marginalized students tools to tell their stories and support in pursuing higher education. The Lang Social Impact Fellowship enabled Rebecca to scale up and continue providing accessible digital media education to diverse students across the country.
• Nimesh Ghimire '15.5 graduated from Swarthmore College with a major in Economics. As a Periclean Scholar, Nimesh was deeply involved in experimenting with and learning from grassroots engagement and innovation models, having co-designed and implemented two Innovation Labs in rural Nepal – a space for community members collaboratively to design solutions to pressing local challenges – over the course of four years. For the fellowship year, Nimesh focused on building the efforts at the Rural Innovation Lab and strengthening the Lab’s core program (as part of the broader effort of Nepal's National Innovation Center), all while working on generating steady revenue streams for sustainable grassroots innovation through the 85°East program. 
• A'Dorian Murray Thomas '16 A special major in Political Science & Educational Studies, A'Dorian founded She Wins, Inc.—a free social action and leadership development program for middle and high school girls in Newark who are affected by violence—while she was a Lang Scholar at Swarthmore College. A trauma-informed program, SHE Wins consists of a summer and afterschool Leadership Academy where girls hone their leadership, literacy, and self-regulatory skills through mentorship, project-based learning, and service-learning opportunities. A'Dorian's goal during the Fellowship year was to continue studying, developing, and scaling systematic and collective approaches to improving outcomes for urban youth. 
• Eriko Shrestha '19 was a double major in Environmental Studies and Political Science while at Swarthmore College. Eriko has continuously thought about how to extend her interest in policies and the environment outside of the classroom. As a Lang Scholar, she founded a partnership with three organizations in Kathmandu on electronic waste (e-waste) advocacy, education, and management. The Fellowship enabled her and her local partners, Karkhana Samuha and Doko Recyclers, to further develop the education component of her Lang Project.