Last Monday, Hannah Gardenswartz SC ’15 was selected to be one of 42 worldwide recipients of the Humanity in Action Fellowship, which gathers international groups of college students and recent graduates in a transatlantic study program that explores historical and contemporary examples of discrimination, minority rights, assimilation, and resistance to injustice.
“Usually, when my parents tell me to look at something on the Internet, I give it a brief glance and immediately dismiss it,” Gardenswartz said. “But when I looked up this program, it was so amazing that I just could not do that.”
A politics and international relations major with a concentration in European politics, Gardenswartz’s particular field of interest is the Balkan region and Eastern Europe. She will be spending one month of the summer in Warsaw, Poland, participating in a course of interdisciplinary study and research that will involve daily lectures with academics, activists, politicians, and journalists as well as site visits to museums, community organizations, government agencies, and memorials.
Gardenswartz is also a French tutor and is minoring in theater.
“I really care about interactions between people from different cultures. It’s what I love about the Claremont Colleges—it’s all about the people you meet and how you become a better person through meeting other people. That’s what really drew me to this fellowship as well. I’m so excited. It’s such a great honor,” she said.
She plans to spend the rest of the summer either at internships in Dublin and Belfast or traveling around Europe.
“I’m scheming about Berlin, Prague, and Budapest,” she said.