Slosberg Travel Grant

The Margaret Gada Slosberg Charitable Foundation

The Slosberg Travel Grant was established for graduate students at The American University of Paris to foster high-level graduate research and activism in the field of social justice.

Provided through the Margaret Gada Slosberg Charitable Foundation by alumna Karen Slosberg MA ’13, this program aims to advance research abroad while incorporating a hands-on humanitarian component. From its creation in 2011 up to today, numerous master’s students have conducted field and scholarly research with a focus on social justice, human rights, humanitarian relief and international development.

AUP graduate students from all programs are eligible to apply for funding to cover the costs of a volunteer/research project with an NGO or civil society organization in the developing world, in an emerging economy or with vulnerable communities in post-industrial societies. Individual grants cover both travel and living expenses. Students are expected to serve as on location volunteers or as participant observers with a local organization for a period of one to six months on location.

Grant Recipients (by academic year)

Grant Recipients from 2011-2012

Grant Recipients from 2012-2013

Sabrina Cook – Education in Palestine Refugee Camps in Lebanon
Sarah Finnigan – Volunteering for community-driven development with Project Mercy in Yetebon, Ethiopia
Rachael Haileselasse – Teaching English in Refugee Camps in Nablus, Palestine
Rachel Hardy – The Necessity of Creativity and Imagination in Education: Fostering Child Development and Resilience in Rural Pondicherry, India
Jesse Tucker Lichtenstein – Translating Social Injustice in Postcolonial Guatemala: El Informante Nativo by Ronald Flores
Kristen McGuiness – Vocational Training in At-Risk Communities: Research into the Role of Restorative Participation & Client Investment
Jessica Proett – Convivencia Today: Interfaith Relation and Interaction in Modern Spain
Eileen Weinstein – Introducing Children of North-African and Sub-Saharan African Decent to the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris

Grant Recipients from 2013-2014

Dawn Booker – Marketing research with special focus in Programing for S.A. NGOs, the Smile Foundation and Afrika Tikkun at Marie Stopes International, Cape Town S.A.
Kathleen Buchholz – Lifeline Energy: Solar Power and Women's Empowerment in Zambia
Rachel Cochran – Teaching English in Refugee Camps in Nablus, Palestine
Judith Cunningham – Sexual Violence as a Systemic Crime within Development Work which Is Dependent on Feminized Laborers in Positions of Heightened Vulnerability: Surveys from former Peace Corps Volunteers within the Pacific Northwest Region (USA)
Amy Dean – Census, Identity, and Its Relationship to Conflict Resolution in Postwar Bosnia-Herzegovina
Elizabeth Ann Gahl – Investigation of the Cuban Dance Community as a Positive Societal Instrument
Elodie Khavarani – Cyprus Case: Transitional Justice & Information
Jean-Baptiste Matton – Central Command Response to Conflict in Central African Republic
Victoria Rose St George – Female Migrant Labor in Malaysia
Tommaso Virgili – Sharia and Human Rights in the Egyptian Constitution
Linda Witters – Young, Single, and Cheap: How Female Migrants Are the Temporary Crutch on which the World Economy Leans in Beijing, China

Grant Recipients from 2014-2015

Grant Recipients from 2015-2016

Lamis Al Jasem – Supporting Syrian Refugee Children Education at Najda Now International in Beirut, Lebanon
Baker Brandy – Volunteering with children in Guatemala
Gurkaya Cansu – Gender Meets Forest & Landscape Restoration: Interning with the World Resources Institute’s Forest and Landscape Restoration department in Delhi, India
Francesca Rose Emma Gottschalk – Voting Behaviors and Attitudes in the “Born Free” Generation in Cape Town, South Africa
Rachel Houston – Social Policy research Assistant Volunteer at MDRC – Improving education and employment opportunities for low-income and disconnected children and adults in the US
Stefanie Kundakjian – Armenia’s Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) Shadow Report with the Women’s Support Center in Armenia
Joshua Laskey – Creating Universal Access for Low-Income Immigrant Students and Their Families through Translation of AVID Materials in California, US

Grant Recipients from 2016-2017

Viviana Alvarado Pacheco – Volunteering at the Caribbean Community Climate Change Center, Belize
Dana Dadoush – Sustainable Management of Relief in Syria’s War Zone: Volunteer work with Canaturk Academic and Research Development in Gaziantep Turkey
Elyse Elder – Community Learning as The Best Weapon to Fight Poverty in South Africa and Zambia
Rachel Fallon – Pathways to Equity and Opportunity by Focusing on the Intersection of Arts and Social Justice with Bronx-Based NGO Dream Yard
Faith Toran – Waste Management with Wasteless in Tamil Nadu, India

Grant Recipients from 2017-2018

Grant Recipients from 2018-2019

Grant Recipients from 2019-2020

Grant Recipients from 2020-2021

Grant Recipients from 2021-2022

Grant Recipients from 2022-2023

Grant Recipients from 2023-2024

Featured Grant Recipients

Prizma Ghimire, The American University in Paris, 2021

Nepalese graduate student Prizma Ghimire focused her thesis research project on how the Covid-19 pandemic is affecting the health and wellbeing of migrant workers returning to Nepal.

The migration crisis has been a growing global issue over the last decade. Since 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has aggravated this already challenging situation. Nepal is a country that has been severely impacted by the pandemic on a humanitarian, social and financial level. Returning Nepalese migrants have been neglected by the government and the world, and their health and wellbeing have been severely impacted by the pandemic.

Prizma conducted a nine-month qualitative study of returning Nepalese migrant workers in collaboration with two NGOs in Nepal: the Centre for Social Change (CSC) and Aamkash Nepal. Based in Kathmandu, CSC focuses on sociopolitical issues in Nepal, including migration, peacebuilding, democracy and governance. Aamkash Nepal is an organization dedicated to education and awareness-raising related to sociopolitical causes led by women, including migration, human trafficking and labor rights.

Prizma was able to learn more about human trafficking and labor migration issues and contribute to spreading awareness of potential solutions by being part of the CSC’s migration mapping project and Aamkash Nepal’s field studies and educational programs. Through her research, Prizma collected data about the situation on the ground for returning migrants in Nepal, who are faced with limited access to information and services, enduring insecurity, and psychological degradation and a sense of helplessness.

Download Prizma’s full program report to find out about her research on the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on returning migrant workers in Nepal.
Apply for a Slosberg Travel Grant.

Andee Brown Gershenberg

Andee Brown Gershenberg, Île-de-France 2019

Andee Gershenberg’s research focuses on the specific experiences of female asylum seekers and refugees in accessing higher educations – particularly, the obstacles that are keeping them from entering into the higher education system or from continuing until completion. Since 2015, France has received an influx of asylum seekers as a result of current global conflicts. As one of the leading members of the European Union, France is highly regarded in terms of the development of sustainable systems for managing migration flows and upholding human and refugee rights. The French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (OFPRA) has reported that over 250,000 asylum requests have been made during this time. This places the nation in a critical position to address the rights and needs of asylum seekers and refugees that extend beyond immediate humanitarian assistance and focus on long-term integration.

Andee’s collaboration with UniR was fundamental in positioning her within the NGO ecosystem. As a result, her research is based on 12 research participants in qualitative interviews regarding their migratory journeys, their academic experiences, and their challenges with integration. Through looking into the lives of the research participants, the research provides an in-depth analysis beginning with an examination of the processes in which each of the women have found value in their education, which is often rooted in childhood experiences.

Download Andee's full program report to find out more about her research on female asylum seekers in the Île-de-France region.
Apply for a Slosberg Travel Grant.

Patricia Molinos

Patricia Molinos, Dominican Republic 2018

The Dominican Republic is among the countries with highest rates of gender-based physical violence against women in the Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC) region and an epicentre of machismo. Yet, femicides – as the most extreme expression of violence against women – are only the visible tip of a much greater and complex iceberg. A wide range of other more subtle ways of discrimination integrated in society lie under the surface but equally push women back from having access to equal opportunities as men. These include, for example, the belief that women are natural caregivers and ought to shoulder the burden of unpaid care and domestic work alone; the condescendence and paternalism with which women are treated throughout their daily lives and at work, even if they are far more qualified; the unequal distribution of power and decision making positions between the two sexes; or the persistent gender wage gap that results in women being paid less for doing exactly the same work as their male colleagues.

Patricia Molinos’ thesis explores these issues and examines the conversation around women´s empowerment through the lens of social stigma in the Dominican Republic. Field research aimed to shed a light on the lesser obvious forms of discrimination such as the aforementioned, which were discussed with key informants to this work. Particularly, the research focussed on identifying what main approaches are in place to advance women's rights and gender equality, what challenges the selected initiatives face and why, and what are potential entry points are to tackle obstacles and eradicate ongoing inequalities.

Download Patricia's full program report to find out more about her work in the Dominican Republic.
Apply for a Slosberg Travel Grant.

Nolwazi Mjwara, Kenya 2017

Despite Kenya's impressive mobile data penetration rates, poverty and unemployment plague Kenya’s youth, especially in the country's slums. Forty five percent of Kenya's population lives in poverty. One in five Kenyan youth are unemployed and Nairobi hosts the highest number of unemployed young adults in the country. Eighty percent of Kenya's population is younger than 35. The youth in Kenya constitute over 50% of the electorate. The year 2017 marked Kenya’s second general election since adopting the 2010 Constitution. The first under this Constitution, in 2013, had lower youth voter turnout than anticipated. In 2016, the United Nations (UN) World Youth Report on Youth Civic Engagement. highlighted that youth participation in electoral processes were on the decline on a global scale. The report also reflected that young adult citizenries who form electorates in Africa are far less likely (34.5% compared to 66.2% in South America) to vote than their counterparts from other continents.

Why are youth participation figures in Africa lower than those of their counterparts? What are some of the communication shortfalls contributing to this problem? Since most young Kenyans acquire most of their information online, what communication efforts were been made by Kenyan civil society to address this political engagement gap for the 2017 election? Kenya's high mobile penetration rates, its digitally savvy youth demographic forming over half of the electorate, the previous low levels of Kenyan youth civic engagement and being a Global Communications student in the Development Track, all contributed to why Nolwazi Mjwara wanted to examine the role of ICTs in youth civic engagement in Kenya. Nolwazi’s study ultimately aimed to contribute to critical, ICT4D and youth civic engagement literature by examining the case of SIDAREC during the 2017 Kenyan presidential election.

Download Nolwazi's full program report to find out more about her fieldwork in Nairobi.
Apply for a Slosberg Travel Grant.

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