Five students from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill were selected as recipients of the 2016 Burch Fellowship to pursue unique and self-initiated proposed experiences anywhere off UNC-Chapel Hill’s campus.
The Burch Fellows Program was established in 1993 by a gift from UNC-CH alumnus Lucius E. Burch, III. Its purpose is to recognize undergraduate students at Carolina who possess extraordinary ability, promise, and imagination. The program supports students who propose self-designed endeavors that will make a demonstrable difference in the selected Burch Fellows’ lives and enable them to pursue a passionate interest in a way and to a degree not otherwise possible. Funding of up to $6,000 is available towards the expenses of each proposed project.
To be chosen as a Burch Fellow, an applicant must give convincing evidence of exceptional intellectual, creative, civic, or leadership ability and promise through the application, recommendations, and interview. The proposed fellowship experience should be one that will allow the pursuit of an intense interest well beyond the scope of an academic course, a vocational commitment, a summer job, internship, or enrichment program. All Carolina undergraduates who meet eligibility requirements may apply.
Sarah K. Adams, class of 2017, is from Greenville, SC and is pursuing a double major in music and communication studies from the College of Arts and Sciences. Sarah will spend the summer in New York City studying the most difficult roles in all of soprano repertoire alongside her mentor and renowned opera singer and teacher, Karen Parks. She will also study the therapeutic benefits of music while singing at boys and girls programs, hospitals, and nursing homes in and around the city.
Sarah B. Hart, class of 2017, is from Randolph, NJ and is majoring in heath policy and management from the Gillings School of Global Public Health and minoring in Spanish from the College of Arts and Sciences. She will spend the summer in Tarapoto, Peru working as a Public Health and Traditional Medicine intern for the Runa Foundation. In partnership with traditional healers, local healthcare providers, and community members, she will conduct a community health assessment to study current health risk factors, outcomes, and treatment seeking behaviors.
Prakash Kadiri, class of 2017, is from Concord, NC and curated his own interdisciplinary studies major in film production and is pursuing a minor in writing for the screen and stage in the College of Arts and Sciences. Having written a fictional screenplay about four military deserters, he will spend his fellowship preparing for production and shooting the 50 minute feature film on celluloid, a medium no longer easily accessible to students. He will be shooting the film at locations around the state of North Carolina.
Aditi Senthilnathan, class of 2017, is from Apex, NC and is majoring in biostatistics at the Gillings School of Global Public Health and minoring in medical anthropology from the College of Arts and Sciences. She will spend eight weeks in Tamil Nadu, India exploring the roles and impacts of rural women hired at Aravind Eye Hospital, the largest ophthalmic provider in the world.
Karl VonZabern, class of 2018, is from Durham, NC and pursuing a double major in political science and Spanish from the College of Arts and Sciences. He will conduct research this summer in Peru on the political ideology of indigenous peoples by interviewing and blogging about porters on the Inca Trail leading to Machu Picchu as well as farmers around Cusco.
Read more about the Burch Fellowships on its website.
