- Fellow Highlights
Fun Facts: 2015 Fellows
The 2015 Fellows come from all over the United States and the world; they represent the diversity and immense promise of New Americans in the country. To paint a more personal picture of the class, we asked each of them a few questions about what they read, watch and listen to– and what and who inspires them.
Mohamad Abedi
PhD in bioengineering at California Institute of Technology
Born in the United Arab Emirates; came to the US at 17; BS from UC Irvine; recipient of NSF Graduate Research Fellowship; developing tools to treat neurological and psychiatric diseases.
Dream mentor: Chang Liu, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Center for Complex Biological Systems, UC Irvine
Favorite family food or dish: Kibbeh
Favorite TV show growing up: Seinfeld
Favorite form of creative expression: Spoken word
The question you most hope graduate school will help you answer: How can we understand and treat neurological and psychiatric diseases?
Oswaldo (Oz) Hasbún Avalos
MD at Columbia University
Born in El Salvador; came to the US at 10; BS from Stanford University; leader and published researcher on medical language interpretation; recognized as a White House Champion of Change.
Number of languages spoken: 3
Dream mentor: Delos “Toby” M. Cosgrove, president and CEO of the Cleveland Clinic
Favorite family food or dish: Pupusas
Favorite guilty pleasure TV show now: The Mindy Project
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to get the training I need to make a lasting impact on the lives and health of underserved communities. It will also give me a lifelong network of mentors and peers that will push me and challenge me to do even more.
Cecil Benitez
MD at Stanford University
Born in Mexico; came to the US at 9; BS from UCLA; PhD in developmental biology from Stanford University; research on pancreas development published in peer-reviewed journals; certified Spanish interpreter.
Dream mentor: Dr. Saul Rosenberg, professor emeritus of oncology at Stanford School of Medicine
Favorite family food or dish: My mom’s enchiladas
Dream job title: Dean of a school or Surgeon General of the United States
Favorite TV show growing up: The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans program is important to me because it gives me the financial flexibility to focus on issues that I want to address and connects me with talented and driven new Americans that have made lasting contributions to the United States. I look forward to learn from this group, so that I too can continue to contribute to this great country.
Shinichi Daimyo
MSN at Yale University
Born in California to Vietnamese and Japanese parents; BA from University of Southern California; MPH from Boston University; Partners In Health expert on developing and implementing community-based mental health programs in low-resource settings globally.
Dream mentor: Dorothea Dix (1802-1887)
Favorite family food or dish: Pho
Number of countries visited: 26
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Obasan by Joy Kogawa
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to transform the profession of nursing into the catalyst of change for addressing the significant burden of mental illness in low resource settings.
Daniela Delgado
MD at Harvard University
Born in Colombia; came to the US at 12; BS from University of Miami; founded community-based research project for farmworker children; looking forward to a career serving immigrants.
Favorite family food or dish: Ajiaco
Favorite genre of music: Merengue
Go-to news source: The New York Times
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans is important to me because it recognizes the efforts and the contributions of immigrants to this country, and it inspires me to continue using my medical training to promote social justice for immigrant communities.
Amal Elbakhar
JD at Harvard University
Born in Morocco; came to the US at 9; BA from Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College, CUNY; wrote award-winning honors thesis on Iran’s healthcare laws for women; continues to focus on women’s issues.
Dream mentor: Elizabeth Warren
Favorite mobile app: Scrabble
Favorite genre of music: Country
Favorite holiday: Eid al-Fitr
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: How the Other Half Lives by Jacob Riis
Favorite TV show growing up: Gilmore Girls
Asmaa Elsayed
EdM in global education at Harvard University
Born in Libya; came to the US at 22; BA from George Mason and MA from American; worked for Oman Ambassador Hunaina Al Mughairy; helped develop early childhood education curricula in Arabic.
Dream mentor: Barack Obama
Dream job title: UN Ambassador
Favorite band: The Beatles
Favorite family food or dish: Masala
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to be just a student for once in my life, I have always had to work multiple odd jobs or work full time while also being a full time student to finance my education and pay off my student loans. I never had the luxury of being just a student and focusing all of my attention on my education.
Arash Fereydooni
MD at Yale University
Born in Iran; came to the US at 16; completing joint 4 year BS/MS at Yale University; master’s thesis on measuring neuronal traction forces; fellowships in robotic surgery; founded NGO to support Syrian refugees.
Number of languages spoken: 4
Favorite family food or dish: Khoresht Gheymeh
Favorite holiday: April Fools’ Day
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Lost in America By Sherwin B. Nuland
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to get to know inspiring New American leaders and problem-solvers, reflect on common challenges of first-generation Americans and utilize the Fellows’ knowledge and expertise to improve the lives of newcomers to this country. Furthermore, the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship makes my educational journey to become a physician much more financially manageable.
Minh-Duyen Thi Nguyen
MD and MPH
Born in Vietnam; came to the US at 5; Gates Millennium and Philip Evans Scholar; BA from Swarthmore; recorded sex workers’ narratives as Watson fellow; focused on medical care for women.
Dream mentor: Catherine Hamlin
Favorite family food or dish: Bún riêu
Favorite TV show growing up: The Simpsons
Dream job title: Director-general of WHO
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts by Maxine Hong Kingston
Favorite genre of music: R&B
Krzysztof Franaszek
MD at Harvard and MIT
Born in Poland; came to the US as a young child; BS & BA from University of Maryland; PhD in pathology at the University of Cambridge; focused on the intersection between biotechnology and medicine.
Number of languages spoken: 3
Dream mentor: Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google; Peter Thiel, co-founder of Paypal & Thiel Foundation
Favorite mobile app: The Economist Espresso
Favorite form of creative expression: Rowing
The question you most hope graduate school will help you answer: How can society create better therapeutics to counter age-dependent disease?
Ledina Gocaj
JD at Harvard University
Born in Albania; came to the US at 8; AB from Princeton; researches the regulation of US financial institutions; will clerk on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
Number of languages spoken: 5
Dream mentor: Madeleine Albright
Dream job title: Secretary of state
Favorite band: Belanova
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to be part of a diverse community of scholars and practitioners who are dedicated to changing our world for the better – a community that would otherwise be unattainable in a single lifetime.
Ayan Hussein
PhD in neuroscience at Yale University
Born in Somalia; came to the US at 16; Bill and Melinda Gates scholar; BS from University of Georgia; researching how dysfunction of inhibitory interneurons impacts development of brain circuits in disease.
Born in Somalia; came to the US at 16; Gates Millennium Scholar; BS from University of Georgia; recipient of NSF Graduate Research Fellowship; researching how dysfunction of inhibitory interneurons impacts development of brain circuits in disease.
Dream mentor: Torsten Nils Wiesel, 1981 Nobel Prize winner in physiology or medicine
Dream job title: Professor of neuroscience
Favorite mobile app: WhatsApp
Number of countries lived in: 4
Favorite band: Passenger
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Tiffanie Hsu
MFA in directing at UCLA
Born in Wisconsin to parents from Taiwan and China; BA from Harvard; award-winning filmmaker dedicated to telling stories that show people struggling with isolation.
Dream mentor: Jill Soloway, Six Feet Under, Afternoon Delight, Transparent
Go-to news source: National Public Radio
Current favorite guilty pleasure TV show: Game of Thrones
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to spend the next two years focused solely on developing and making films that best represent my voice as a filmmaker. It also gives me the opportunity to meet and hear the stories of New Americans who will be changing the world in the coming decades.
Evgeniya Kim
MBA at Yale University
Born in Uzbekistan; ethnically Korean; came to the US at 14; ancestors exiled from Siberia; BA from Macaulay Honors Hunter College, CUNY; pursuing business strategy and economic development.
Number of countries visited: 32
Dream mentor: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Favorite form of creative expression: Sports
Go-to news source: The Wall Street Journal
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
Current favorite guilty pleasure TV show: The Mindy Project
Ismael Loera Fernandez
PhD in chemistry at Rice University
Born in Mexico; came to the US at 11; undergraduate campus leader; BS from Emory University; DACA recipient; works on synthesizing bismuth carboxylate complexes; passionate about higher education.
Dream Mentor: Robert Woodward (1917 –1979), chemist
Favorite family food or dish: Mole
Current favorite guilty pleasure TV show: Scandal
Favorite form of creative expression: Experimenting in the Lab
Favorite US city: Miami
Favorite TV show growing up: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Allen Lin
PhD in systems biology at Harvard University
Born in New Jersey to Taiwanese parents; MEng and BS degrees from MIT; MPhil in technology policy and MSc in public health as a Marshall Scholar; focused on cost-effective HIV vaccinations and therapies.
Dream mentor: Bill Gates
Favorite family food or dish: Stir-fried sticky rice cakes (Nian gao)
Go-to news source: The Atlantic, The New Yorker and The New York Times
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans is important to me because it provides a supportive community of leading thinkers and doers, who have all drawn from their rich experiences as immigrants or as children of immigrants. The fellowship highlights how much immigrants have to offer to the continual progress of our country.
Paras Singh Minhas
MD and PhD in neuroscience at Stanford University
Born in Maryland to Sikh parents from India; BS from University of Pittsburgh; awarded Amgen, Goldwater, and Marshall scholarships; founded NGO that serves orphans in Ghana and India.
Dream mentor: Sidney Poitier
Go-to news source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Current favorite guilty pleasure TV show: House of Cards
Dream job title: Endowed professor & department chair
Favorite city in the US: Pittsburgh
Number of organizations you’ve founded: 3
Polina Nazaykinskaya
DMA in music composition at The Graduate Center, CUNY
Born in Russia; came to the US at 21; BA from Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory College; MM from Yale School of Music; 2015 recipient of the Charles Ives Scholarship from the AAAL.
Dream mentor: Arvo Pärt
Favorite family food or dish: Potato pierogi
Dream job title: Composer
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Little Failure by Gary Shteyngart
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? Being a 2015 Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow will allow me to continue pursing my dream of becoming a professional composer. Through my music I would like to transform the listening experience into an awakening of the soul as success for me is defined primarily in terms of the ability to touch the hearts of the audience and allow them to experience a profound sense of reverence for beauty and for life.
Lucy Ogbu-Nwobodo
MD at University of California, Davis
Born in Nigeria; brought to the US at 11; was undocumented for 12 years; BS from California State University, East Bay; co-director of a student-run clinic; plans to specialize in neurosurgery.
Dream mentor: Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa
Favorite family food or dish: Jollof rice
Favorite mobile app: RunKeeper
Dream job title: Neurosurgeon
Favorite holiday: Christmas
Go-to news source: NPR
Sandra Portocarrero
PhD in sociology at Columbia University
Born in Peru; came to the US at 16; BA from UC Berkeley; McNair and Haas Scholar; studying the effects of the US prison system on the lives of Latino immigrants.
Number of languages spoken: 4
Dream mentor: Hillary Clinton
Favorite form of creative expression: Writing
Dream job title: Professor of Sociology (with tenure!)
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: Immigrant America: A Portrait by Alejandro Portes and Rubén G. Rumbaut
Go-to news source: The New York Times
Yakir Reshef
MD and PhD in computer science at Harvard University and MIT
Born in Israel; came to the US at 6; BA from Harvard; developed a statistical method for detecting new relationships in large data sets, published in Science; Fulbright scholar in Israel.
Dream mentor: Claude Shannon (1916 – 2001), mathematician and computer scientist
Favorite form of creative expression: Playing the fiddle
Dream job title: Professor of medicine and computer science
Current favorite guilty pleasure TV show: Friday Night Lights
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans is important to me because it symbolizes the values that make America a vibrant and dynamic place. I’m proud to count myself among a group of people so committed to those ideals.
Raeuf Roushangar
PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology at Michigan State University
Born in Oman; discriminated against in Egypt because of Bahá’i faith; came to the US at 20; homeless for 6 months; findings published on genetic interactions in human orofacial clefting syndromes.
Dream mentor: John Von Neumann (1903 –1957),
Ahmed Zewail, 1999 recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Favorite family food or dish: Kushari
Favorite US city: East Lansing
Favorite genre of music: Neo soul
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans is important to me because it will give me the freedom to tackle novel research problems and keep up with the latest scientific developments, without any financial burdens. The resulting independence will make it easier for me to develop my own individual creative spirit. In doing so, I will be inspired not only to work towards becoming a scientist, but also to further develop my own philosophy of American citizenship and how I can make it a part of my everyday professional life.
Eugene Rusyn
JD at Yale University
Born in Kiev; Russian mother and Carpatho-Ruthenian father; came to the US at 4; BA from NYU; worked with Tony Judt on several books and articles; focused on constitutional and environmental law.
Dream mentor: Georgia O’Keeffe
Number of countries visited: 16
Number of languages spoken: 4
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: The World of Yesterday by Stefan Zweig
What will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? This Fellowship will allow me to study without worrying about taking on debts that would narrow what I do. I can follow my interests freely—the most important gift of all.
Andre Shomorony
MD at Harvard and MIT
Born in Brazil; moved to Miami at 15; BS from Yale; directed award-winning a cappella group; researched micro-tissue engineering and cancer biology; hopes to work at intersection of engineering and surgery.
Number of languages spoken: 4
Dream mentor: Dr. Brian Labow, Boston Children’s Hospital
Favorite genre of music: A cappella
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
Favorite holiday: Purim
Favorite band: Lake Street Dive
Sahar Soleimanifard
MD at Johns Hopkins University
Born in Iran; BS from Sharif University; came to US at 23; developed MRI methodology as PhD student at Johns Hopkins; Siebel Scholar; hopes to apply engineering to her medical career.
Dream mentor: Sheryl Sandberg
Favorite family food or dish: Persian Pomegranate & Walnut Stew
Favorite mobile app: Foodspotting
Favorite US city: Washington, DC
Favorite form of creative expression: Furniture design, especially mid-century modern
Favorite TV show growing up: Friends
Stephanie Speirs
MBA at MIT
Born in Hawaii to Chinese and Korean parents; BA from Yale; MPA from Princeton; youngest-ever director at the White House National Security Council; Acumen global fellow; co-founder of US-based solar social enterprise.
Number of countries visited: 26
Dream mentor: Barack Obama
Favorite TV show growing up: X-Files
Favorite US city: New Orleans
Favorite holiday: Thanksgiving
Favorite American landmark: Koolau Mountains, Oahu Hawaii
Gerald Chunt-Sein Tiu
MD and PhD in genetics at Stanford University
Born in California to Burmese-Chinese parents; BA from Harvard; third place in team Siemens Competition in Math, Science, and Technology; now researching novel layers of RNA-mediated gene regulation.
Dream mentor: Fred Sanger
Favorite family food or dish: Oh Noh Kauswer (Burmese Coconut Noodle Soup)
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
Favorite form of creative expression: Dance
Go-to news source: CNN
The question you most hope graduate school will help you answer: What processes regulate gene expression in development? How are these progresses dysregulated in developmental genetic disorders?
Katherine Karmen Trujillo
MA in law and diplomacy at Tufts University
Born in California to parents from Mexico and Honduras; BA from UC Berkeley; Mitchell Scholar finishing MA degree at Ulster University; hopes to be a civic leader in South Central Los Angeles.
Dream mentor: Cecilia Muñoz, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, and Samantha Power, United States ambassador to the United Nations
Favorite TV show growing up: The Wonder Years
Dream job title: President of the United States
Go-to news source: BBC and NPRWhat will the PD Soros Fellowship allow you to do? Being a 2015 Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow will equip me with the knowledge and training I need to empower impoverished communities–economically, socially, culturally and politically–and create cycles of prosperity that allow residents to take charge of their own futures. It will help me continue to pay-it-forward as others have done for me.
Mark Minghao Xue
MS in computer science at Stanford University
Born in China; came to the US at 5; BA from Columbia; coached NYC Math Team; served as a marine officer and helicopter pilot for 8 years; created software to improve pilot safety.
Dream mentor: Donald E. Knuth, computer scientist and mathematician
Favorite TV show growing up: Batman: The Animated Series
Favorite form of creative expression: Programming
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: L.A. Son: My Life, My City, My Food by Roy Choi with Tien Nguyen and Natasha Phan
Why is the PD Soros Fellowship important to you? The Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans is important to me because it will help me transition from military service to public service as a computer scientist. It will afford me the opportunity to contemplate hard problems in computer science, and the ethical and societal implications of software in society.
Julie Zhu
MFA in combined media at Hunter College, CUNY
Born in Michigan to Chinese parents; BA from Yale; carillonneur for St. Thomas Church in Manhattan; art focuses on intersection of music, mathematics and visual representation.
Number of countries visited: 21
Dream mentor: Yoko Ono
Favorite mobile app: The Free Dictionary
Go-to news source: Hyperallergic and The New York Times
Favorite US city: Sitka
Favorite book about the immigrant experience: In the Light of What We Know by Zia Haider Rahman
Featured Fellows
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Julie Zhu
MFA, Hunter College of the City University of New York
Julie Zhu is the child of immigrants from China. Fellowship awarded in 2015 to support work towards an MFA in Painting at Hunter College of the City University of New York
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Mark Xue
CTO and Co-Founder, Germ Network
Mark Xue is an immigrant from China. Fellowship awarded in 2015 to support work towards an MS in Computer Science at Stanford University
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