³Ô¹ÏÍø President’s Summer Fellowship
The President’s Summer Fellowship offers students a chance to think big and tackle a summer project that combines intellectual pursuit, imagination, adventure, personal transformation, and service to the greater good. The program was established in 2012 and is made possible with generous support from Dan Greenberg '62 and Susan Steinhauser.
President's Summer Fellowship Winners 2025
Reed is proud to announce the winners of the President’s Summer Fellowship for 2025.
Alta Freedman ‘26
Organizational Dynamics of Intentional Communities: A study of social structures fostering sustainable living
This summer, I will conduct ethnographic research and work exchanges with farm-based intentional communities. These agricultural communities, which take many forms, offer an alternative life path, one that centers sustainable practices and acknowledges our interdependency with each other and all beings. The climate crisis and the high cost of housing pose existential threats to my generation. Intentional, sustainable living communities may be a productive response to these challenges. Cohabitating, sharing material resources, and working towards self-sufficiency are integral practices in reducing destructive human impact. Motivated by a collective and personal desire to live in community, I will interview stewards of community and the land, gathering knowledge on how such communities succeed. Through working on the land, I will expand my knowledge of sustainable practices such as gardening, farming, and natural building. Developing an understanding of these sustainable practices, as well as community structure and organization, will focus my own efforts to effect positive change. The stories and experiences gleaned from my research will culminate in a risograph-printed zine to be shared with peers.
Asa Marley-Jester ‘27
Seeking to Express the Harmony One Feels When Deeply Engaged in Contemplation
This summer, I will live in a Zen Buddhist temple in Spain for eight weeks, deepening my Zen practice and creating electronic music inspired by the rhythmic chants and rituals. I spent the last semester at Oxford, where I learned to explore the universe through reading and writing. While I'll never stop exploring, I'm ready to move beyond language and intellect, harmonizing with the world through Zen's embodied practice—hours of meditation and constant mindfulness. This pursuit and the lack of distraction will fuel imaginative music production, stretching my creativity and allowing me to express my experience of harmony. I aim to grow by balancing my intense academic life with Zen's wordless depth. I'll share my music and may start a Reed meditation club to offer this harmony to others. The greatest challenge of this project will be the intensity of the temple life and the lack of distraction from introspection. I am sure, however, that this intensity and introspection will allow me to grow and create harmony through music.
Forrest Feist ‘27
The Fruits of New England
In the river valleys of New England, where I grew up, people talk about fruit and vegetables as another part of the weather. The rocky soil prevented the large-scale agriculture we see on the West Coast from developing, and created communities that are built on networks of subsistence farms. New England farms are facing the increasing effects of climate change, which bring fire, flood, and early freezes. This crisis threatens the livelihoods of these farms and ultimately changes the cultural imagination of the place I call home. The focus of this project will be to take photos of as many of the farms and orchards that have shaped the communities where I grew up, and to preserve the legacy of the landscape they create. Climate change poses an immediate threat to all people, and in this project, I will explore how climate change shifts and disrupts the traditions that make me who I am. In taking these photos, I will assess the relationship between home and environment and how a communal definition of home is challenged by climate change.
Isabelle Wong ‘26
Show Me Your Chinatown: Exploring Chinatowns around the Nation
In the 1850s, a surge of Chinese immigrants entered the U.S., eager to take advantage of the economic opportunities, but in exchange, they faced racial discrimination, leading them to establish ethnic enclaves. Today, with roughly 50 Chinatowns across the nation, almost every major city in the U.S. has a Chinatown. Despite the name, they have grown to serve the broader Asian American community. And yet, I grew up in suburban Minnesota without one. Through the medium of film, I will create a documentary exploring the impact of Chinatown on three different community members from their respective Chinatowns in three prominent cities: San Francisco, New York, and Philadelphia. For me, Chinatowns were simply a travel destination where I could celebrate my culture, but for my collaborators—and many others—Chinatown is so much more. However, many U.S. Chinatowns struggle against gentrification threats and economic decline while battling challenges of authenticity, homogenization, and their place in the Asian American experience. In understanding my collaborators’ relationship to Chinatown, I will explore and celebrate the many interpretations of Asian Americanness and center the vibrant communities that they call home.
Lutetia Wang ‘26
Revisiting Old West Gate: Art Book as a Practice of Research
The Old West Gate (Lao Ximen) or the old city of Shanghai has complicated the idea of borders and territory throughout time. Beginning as a merchant’s city dating back to the 1500s, the old city was walled off from coastal pirate attacks, then integrated into Shanghai’s semi-colonial concessions with the destruction of its walls in 1912. It is now subject to demolition and urban gentrification projects that will soon completely transform its physical geography. The destruction or transformation of the Old West Gate, in many ways, has been an ongoing process since the late 19th century, in the memories or lived experiences of its inhabitants across generations. I will explore how the Old West Gate’s gradual disappearance is a continuous historical process in relation to its erasure from collective memory and imagination. To do so, I will embark on an interdisciplinary art book project documenting Old West Gate’s changes throughout 2020-2025 with analog photography, archival research, and oral history interviews. Ultimately, I will present this art book at Reed Zine Fest 2026 and other independent art book fairs.
Mariia Vorozhko ‘27
Scattered, but yet unshattered: Ukrainian culture and identity abroad
Ukraine’s path in the world has never been simple—the country has been subjugated by neighboring states for centuries, which led to mass emigration out of it over time. The US remains a place with one of the biggest Ukrainian populations in the world, which approached 1.5 million at the beginning of 2025. The already existing Ukrainian diaspora in the US, strengthened by the arrival of newcomers due to the Russian invasion in 2022, was able to build strong networks with its American counterparts and help Ukraine from abroad, as well as spread the culture thousands of miles away from the country. My project will examine the lives of Ukrainians in the US and their contributions to their home country’s development, which I will explore by traveling to the areas with high Ukrainian populations and Ukrainian institutions: Boston, New York City, and Chicago. I will interview Ukrainian people and visit Ukrainian cultural sites, illustrating how Ukrainians navigate their lives abroad while remembering and cherishing their heritage. My project will conclude with talking to people who currently live in Ukraine, which will reveal the country’s residents’ perception of the diaspora, and its impact, or the lack thereof, on Ukraine.
Nathan Holland ‘26
Sleeping Green Giant: Exploring the Legacy and Impact of the Environmental State in the Northwest, by Bicycle
It’s not the golden age of environmental action in the US anymore. The hard-fought battles that brought us to where we are today no longer have the mighty force of an undivided public to fall back on, and the vibrant stories of communities impacted by these policies fade with the passing of time. I’d like to embark on a grand journey by bicycle to document the ideas, philosophy, literature, and human side of the movement and policies that created the American environmental state. I’ll travel, human speed, through the Northwest, exploring the rich legacy of environmental policy with a level of detail only possible at 12-15 mph. I want to capture the beauty of this country and the strong rules that keep it that way, as well as highlight necessary, new, and innovative ideas on policy and stewardship, and upload my work to the internet. I aim to add to the discourse on environmental policy and public lands, offering fresh perspectives and showcasing examples of foundational laws like the Clean Air, Clean Water, Wilderness, and Endangered Species Acts. I’m also excited to explore lesser-discussed but equally–if not more–important ideas, like the Superfund Act, Indigenous traditional ecological knowledge, and many more.
Percy Okoben ‘26
Warp and Weft: An Exploration of Ancient Weaving Techniques
In ancient Greece, everyday people’s clothes were made by members of their community and intended to last for years. This care and closeness is striking to me as a fiber artist who thinks regularly about how most of the clothes we wear are thoroughly undervalued and made by people whom we will probably never meet. For the President’s Summer Fellowship, I will spend the summer creating a Cooley Gallery display that documents ancient Greek weaving techniques. This process will intersect my academic interests as a GLAM major with my personal interests as a fiber artist while giving me relevant experience in creating an educational display in preparation for my goal of getting a Master's in Library and Information Science. I will prepare, dye, and spin raw wool, ideally in ways that would have been accessible to the average ancient Greek fiber artist. Then, on a hand-made small-scale loom, which I will also use as part of my display, I will weave the yarn into one plain piece of fabric and one more decorative one, taking inspiration from modern weavers in places like Naxos and Crete who have passed down techniques for generations.