Three Black Studies Majors Are Honored

Naajidah Correll, Bryan Guichardo and Nana Minder, from the Black Studies Program at The City College of New York, are 2017 Mellon Mays Fellows.  The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program is the centerpiece of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s initiatives to increase diversity in the faculty ranks of institutions of higher learning.

Fellows have demonstrated academic ability and an aspiration to pursue a doctoral degree in selected humanities, social sciences and physical sciences. The fellowship provides fellows with structured programming; faculty mentoring; support for research activities; and repayment of undergraduate loans up to $10,000.

“The MMUF program is preparing me for my life goal of becoming a professor within the humanities, “ said Correll, who is also a Colin Powell Fellow and fellow of the Skadden, Arps Honors Program in Legal Studies. “Upon graduating, it is my hope to join Stanford’s Modern Thought in Literature and Law JD/PhD program, which is directed by Mellon Mays Fellow and professor Bernadette Meyler.”

2017 Mellon Fellows and their research topics are:

Naajidah Correll (junior, literature, Black Studies minor) will be at the University of California, Los Angeles this summer for a six-week program to work on her research topic the resurgence of African spirituality in New York City, specifically among Black and Latin communities and seeing the correlation between certain political movements.

Bryan Guichardo (junior, anthropology and Black Studies) is researching racial and ethnic identity through hair, within Afro-Latinx communities, with a focus on Dominican Studies.

Nana Minder (junior, sociology and Black Studies, Women’s Studies minor) is researching Black girls in schools, particularly girls in the school-to-prison pipeline with high expulsion rates. She is doing research alongside Dr. Terri Watson at A. Phillip Randolph Campus High School and will be writing a book chapter with her on their work.

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