About my Watson Fellowship

Thanks to the leadership of the late President John Strassburger, I belonged to the first graduating class of Ursinus College students who were eligible to apply for the Watson Fellowship. The Watson Fellowship influenced the trajectory of my career and outlook on life in ways in which I could not have imagined when I boarded a plane for Nairobi in the summer of 2002. I began my journey with the Luo communities of Kenya and Tanzania, before continuing on to Brazil. I then experienced Portugal and three former Soviet-occupied states: Poland, Moldova and Ukraine. I found resilient communities determined to work together and build a better future for themselves, and this experience helped inspire me to pursue a career in international economics and public service. You do not need to know how it will affect your life and career when you set out, but you can be certain that it will.