The Impact Center Fellowships
Congratulations to our 2023 Fellows!
Celeste Bloom '24
Anai Dominguez '24
Katharine "Kit" Briggs '25
A Funded Anti-Racist Research Opportunity:
Are you interested in a funded research opportunity? Want to dig into an area of diversity, equity, inclusion and anti-racism impacting the Bryn Mawr College community?
The Impact Center Fellowships support projects that contribute to our histories, enhance our programs and add to the College's goal of building equity, inclusion and anti-racism in our community. Fellows are mentored by faculty or staff members, have regular check-ins with a member of The Impact Center staff and receive a stipend. International students and U.S. students who are citizens, permanent residents, DACA-mented, or undocumented are encouraged to apply.
Applications are accepted on a rolling basis; the priority deadline for Summer 2023 fellowships is March 15. For guidance and more information, contact Assistant Dean Vanessa Christman (vchristm@brynmawr.edu) or any member of the selection committee.
The Impact Center awards fellowships to undergraduates throughout the academic year and over the summer. These fellowships support projects that contribute to our histories, enhance our programs and add to the College's goal of building equity, inclusion and anti-racism in our community. Fellows are mentored by faculty or staff members and have regular check-ins with a member of The Impact Center staff.
Examples of fellowship projects include—but are not limited to—collecting, organizing and annotating oral histories, letters, photographs and other historical materials; surveying community members about existing programs; and working alongside staff to create and develop programming. Past research has culminated in permanent additions to the College's archives, exhibitions on campus and other significant contributions.
The Impact Center Fellowship began in 2013 in response to the shuttering of Perry House and the dearth of archival material about it, its residents and the experiences of students, faculty and staff of color at Bryn Mawr. Currently, these fellowships provide stipends for project periods of varying lengths. Applications will be accepted and evaluated on a rolling basis.
Vanessa Christman, Assistant Dean for Access and Community Development, Chair
David Consiglio, Director of Assessment, Learning Spaces and Special Projects
Gabrielle Gary, Associate Director of Affinity Programs (ARD)
Allison Mills, College Archivist
Ann-Therese Ortiz, Associate Dean for Equity, Inclusion and Community Life
Chanelle Wilson, Assistant Professor of Education
Current Fellows
Beza Wondwossen '23 is a Mathematics major and Africana Studies minor from the Greater Boston area. She is a member of Boston Posse 19 and has worked in dining services and was previously a Community Diversity Assistant for the New Dorm dormitory. She is currently serving as a Black at Bryn Mawr tour guide, is an active member in the Enid Cook Center community and is the current Co-President of Sisterhood*. This summer, she will be working on expanding the Black at Bryn Mawr Project and preserving the hard work of the alumnae/i before her to educate the Bryn Mawr Community and beyond. During the 2020 Strike, the Black at Bryn Mawr virtual tour, created by Khari Bowman '21, was a very useful tool in aiding the anti-racism pedagogy that the Strike Coalition worked so hard to create. As a remote student that year, Beza realized how important it was to amplify Black bodies on campus and was truly inspired to work on more accessible options for the tour. Through her research, she will be creating a self-guided virtual QR code-based portion of the tour, bringing back old tour stops to ensure that they are accurately accounted for, and making sure that all of the work in the Black at Bryn Mawr project is carefully preserved in the digital archives of the college.
Breanna Brown is a Psychology major from the Bronx, New York. She is an AMO Coordinator with the Pensby Center, works with Conferences & Events, serves as a student advisor to President Cassidy, and, as of recently, a Community Diversity Assistant. She is an active member of the Enid Cook Center community, which contributed to her inspiration for her project. Living in the Enid Cook Center, and being a part of AMO groups such as Sisterhood*, BACaSO, and the NAACP, Breanna has had the opportunity to be in a welcoming community that has provided comfort over the span of her college experience so far. With this, she has realized from her own experience and others’ how the community at Bryn Mawr has more work to do regarding making our school a safe and equitable school. When the Spring 2021 campus climate survey had an outstandingly low response number from the BIPOC community, it inspired Breanna to create one that is more tailored to the BIPOC community at Bryn Mawr, in an effort to aid in the conversation How to make Bryn Mawr College a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment. In addition, the campus climate survey merely provides information in numbers; by interviewing and providing transcribed narratives of anonymous student experiences, this project has the ability to provide an explanation for that data. Her project this summer will create a campus climate survey that captures the uncensored perspectives of BIPOC students at Bryn Mawr College.
Fellowship Application