University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill senior Frances Reuland has been selected for the elite James C. Gaither Junior Fellows Program run by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is UNC-Chapel Hill’s second recipient of this one-year award. The Junior Fellows Program provides substantive work experience at the Carnegie Endowment for students and recent graduates with career interests in international affairs.
Reuland, 21, will graduate in May 2018 with a double major in environmental sciences and Hispanic literature and culture and a minor in chemistry. She is the daughter of Daniel Reuland and Paula Paradis from Chapel Hill.
“Frances’s extraordinary service to others has ranged from tutoring in our local communities to surveying environmental health conditions in Malawi,” said Chancellor Carol L. Folt. “This is a wonderful opportunity for Frances to expand further her global horizons following her success at Carolina as a student-scholar-athlete. I have no doubt that her climate and energy studies – combined with her dedication to helping people – will contribute to our world’s understanding of significant environmental challenges.”
Reuland is one of only 12 fellows selected for the prestigious Junior Fellows Program. She will work full time at the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, D.C., as a paid research assistant to the endowment’s senior associates in the Energy and Climate Program.
“I’m honored to become a Junior Fellow at Carnegie and am incredibly excited to learn about and contribute to research on national and international energy and climate issues,” said Reuland. “I’m very grateful for the opportunities and support at UNC-Chapel Hill that have helped me get to this spot.”
At Carolina, Reuland was a first-year walk-on to the women’s varsity soccer team. An Honors Carolina student, Phi Beta Kappa inductee and Buckley Public Service Scholar, Reuland won the NCAA Elite 90 Award in 2016, awarded to student athletes with the highest grade-point averages in the NCAA finals. Reuland’s research interests took her to Malawi, where she surveyed environmental health conditions in health care facilities. She earned an Honors Thesis Research Award to support her honors thesis on the same topic. Reuland was a volunteer translator for the Center for Latino Health at UNC Hospitals and a volunteer tutor for the English as a Second Program at Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools.
“Frances is an impressive scholar-athlete-researcher. We are delighted that she will have this opportunity at the Carnegie Foundation to meet world leaders in energy and climate change, and to learn about how policy decisions can be informed by cutting-edge research,” said Professor Inger Brodey, director of the Office of Distinguished Scholarships. “She will also be in a position to continue her own research on the effects of climate change on water, energy and health care.”
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, one of the world’s leading think tanks specializing in international affairs, conducts programs of research, discussion, publication and education in international relations and U.S. foreign policy. Each year the endowment offers approximately 10–15 one-year fellowships to uniquely qualified graduating seniors and individuals who have graduated during the past academic year. The program was recently named in honor of Jim Gaither, the former chairman of the Board of Trustees for the Carnegie Endowment. Junior Fellows receive a monthly salary equivalent to $38,000 annually and a generous benefits package.
