Twenty students from Loyola Marymount University have been accepted to the Millennium Fellowship Class of 2020, a select group of young leaders from 80 college campuses worldwide who will work to localize United Nations sustainable development goals.
This fall marks the first time that LMU will host the ambitious semester-long leadership development program for undergraduates, with the goal of developing and improving their student organizing, partnership building and community impact skills. The LMU students, who are among 1,438 fellows in 20 countries, were chosen from a record 15,159 applications across 135 nations.
“This fellowship program takes student-led social impact initiatives to the next level,” said Roberta Espinoza, LMU vice provost for global-local initiatives. “LMU fellows will spend their semester focused on issues of critical importance, including the displacement of populations due to climate change, and the promotion of sustainable lighting and power sourcing initiatives. Given the cross-section of talent and the students’ commitment to shared goals, I have no doubt that their hard work will make a difference.”
LMU’s selection as a program host campus underscores the university’s commitment to provide opportunities for students to participate in discussions about environmental issues, and its support of Green LMU, which has led dozens of sustainability initiatives on campus. It also comes the same year as an important milestone: in January, LMU was admitted as an observer to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
The Millennium Fellowship program is presented by the Millennium Campus Network and United Nations Academic Impact, a U.N. initiative to align institutions of higher education, scholarship and research with the United Nations and with each other. Its aim is to convene, challenge, and celebrate student leadership advancing U.N. goals.
With support from the Office of National and International Fellowships, LMU students representing five colleges conceptualized a pair of community-focused sustainable development-related projects. Their efforts will focus on:
- The emerging climate-refugee crisis, which encompasses people forced to move within their country, or leave for another, when climate change makes their home unlivable; communities of color surrounding Los Angeles with inadequate access to clean water; and natural disasters and desertification. The team will virtually campaign and sell fair-trade items to raise money for the CoolEarth Project and Environmental Justice Foundation;
- The promotion of green consulting solutions, including sustainable lighting and power sourcing, to the campus community and leadership. The team will focus on LED (versus fluorescent) lighting, and power strips and outlets with on/off switches that are designed to stop the unnecessary flows of energy.
LMU’s fellows are: Alex Alford, film production; Lucy Brandstrader, liberal studies; Cameo Brown, psychology and communication studies; Raymond Cangkimvo, math and theology; Mackenzie Clark, film production and Spanish; Kelsie Constable, environmental studies; Rebecca Davenport, biology; Roberta Ferraz Dal Lago Garcia, engineering; Taylor Flanagan, mathematics; Reilly Grzywacz, environmental studies; Jessica Laar, psychology; Leigh Lewis, psychology; William Lighthart, international relations and history; Fosse Lin-Bianco, electrical engineering; Isabella Lucero, communication studies; Amanda Meegan, marketing; Andrew Seaman, computer science; Maya Wazana, psychology and entrepreneurship; Megan West, electrical engineering; and Kyle Wilson, psychology.
More information about the Millennium Fellowship Class of 2020 can be found on their website.
