Vanderbilt University seniors Kathryn Moreadith and Rob Whiting will spend a year traveling the world after graduation this May as the recipients of the university’s Michael B. Keegan Traveling Fellowship.
The goal of the fellowship is to develop future leaders through world travel and experiential learning. Graduating seniors awarded the fellowship have the opportunity to pursue an idea or an issue, about which they are impassioned, in the context of daily life in communities around the world.
Students must apply for the fellowship by completing an application, submitting a resume and letters of recommendation and proposing a plan of study/travel. A committee of alumni, faculty and staff selects the winner.
Moreadith, who is from Raleigh, N.C., will graduate from the Blair School of Music with majors in composition/theory and East Asian studies and minors in piano performance and Chinese. She will spend her year studying how music is incorporated into the cultural practices of geographically, politically and socially disparate regions of the world.
By exploring music beyond her Western classical background, Moreadith hopes to illuminate the ways cross-cultural transmission can be achieved through an artistic medium. She plans for her studies to take her to China, Egypt, India, the United Kingdom, South Africa and Indonesia, among other destinations. Her year of study will culminate in a review of her research conducted in the United Kingdom, where she will work with mentors from the Royal Academy of Music and the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.
Whiting, who is from Fernandina Beach, Fla., will graduate from the College of Arts and Science with majors in economics and East Asian studies. He is a participant in the Ingram Scholarship Program, which requires students to commit to volunteerism while at Vanderbilt and to demonstrate a commitment to combine a career in business or a business-related field with community service. He is also founder and director of Vanderbilt Students for Students, a non-profit student organization dedicated to helping low-income students gain access to educational opportunities.
Seeking to better understand poverty is how Whiting will spend his yearlong fellowship. He plans to study how poverty differs across nations, and what approaches, especially sustainable market-based solutions, are being applied to combat poverty through his project, titled “At the Crossroads of Business and Philanthropy”.
To better understand the disadvantaged, Whiting plans to arrange home stays, do hands-on service work with the disadvantaged and engage in other situations that will give him direct interaction at the community level. At the same time, he will engage with local and international organizations through site visits, volunteering, interviews, and informal observation and communication. He hopes that by the end of his travels, he will have a deeper understanding of poverty from a global perspective and insight into poverty alleviation tools and strategies, especially market-based approaches.
Following the fellowship, he plans to join one of the organizations dedicated to alleviating poverty in one of the areas he has visited.
For more information about the Michael B. Keegan Traveling Fellowship, visit www.vanderbilt.edu/travelfellowship/ or contact Associate Dean of Students Sandy Stahl at 615-322-6400.
Media contact: Princine Lewis, 615-322-NEWS
princine.lewis@vanderbilt.edu