Four Seniors Awarded Stride Rite Fellowships

Four seniors will be able to pursue full time community service projects next year as recipients of the Stride Rite Community Service Post-Graduate Fellowship, given in partnership with the Philip Brooks House Association (PBHA).

The four fellowship recipients-Natalie Guerrier `01, Gail N. King `01, Janak D. Ramakrishnan `01, and Michael H. Tang `01-will be honored during tonight's dinner and reception at the Phillips Brooks House.

The fellowships, ranging from $10,000 to $25,000, will give the recipients the necessary funds to spend the upcoming year pursuing community service projects.

The recipient's projects include providing transitional support to youth returning home from detention facilities and teaching math in India to underprivileged students from a fishing village.

The students were selected by a ten person committee comprised of past fellowship recipients, Stride Rite Foundation members, and community leaders. The applicants were judged on the basis of their past community service experience and their project proposals.

"We consider how the project ties in with what the students have done in the past and where they are headed in the future," said Maria J. Dominguez, deputy director of Phillips Brooks House Association. "We like to see a project that makes sense in light of what they have been doing and where they are going."

"The applicant pool was exceptional. It was one of the hardest selection processes we've had to make," Dominguez added.

Tang will spend the next two years as the Cambridge regional coordinator for Project HEALTH-a nationwide program that helps underprivileged children receive adequate healthcare.

Tang, who plans on going to medical school, praised the experience he got while working with Project HEALTH.

"I got a chance to see first hand the connection between poverty and health," Tang said. "As a doctor, it is very important to understand that in order to do good medicine, you have to think beyond the doctor's office, into the schools, and into the community."

Guerrier, who also plans on working in medicine, said she will gain experience in public health by working with thirty Dorchester teenagers as a health coordinator for the non-profit Urban Dreams.

Ramakrishnan plans to teach math to high school students in the southern Indian village of Madras.

"Most teachers in India don't have more than a high school degree," he said.

And King will work with troubled children once they are released from juvenile detention facilities.

Along with the four post-graduate fellowship recipients, forty-four other students will be honored at tonight's dinner ceremony.

Nine seniors will receive prize money for four years of commitment to community service. In addition, thirty-five undergrads who received work-study scholarships from the Stride Rite Foundation in order to do community service work throughout the year will be recognized.

The Stride Rite Foundation, began its partnership with PBHA in 1983. At that point, it was one of the only examples of a corporation supporting a university community service program.

"This grant is open to just undergraduates, so it offers a great opportunity to kids who often can't find people to take a chance on them to lead major service projects," Dominguez said.