Phi Beta Kappa

Grace Dowling ’24 is majoring in sociology. She is an active member of her school’s mutual aid collective, where she’s nurtured her interest in social and economic justice. For the past two years, Grace has learned about nonprofit work and wealth redistribution through her role as the program coordinator of the Greater Worcester Community Foundation. After college, Grace aspires to work to promote alternatives to incarceration and aims to become a judge in a court of restorative justice. In her free time, Grace enjoys biking, writing in her journal, and reading.

Alec Hoffman ’23 studies political science and history. He is the co-president of his university’s Model United Nations and has run for its cross-country team since his freshman year. Outside of school, Alec interned for Congressman Jim McGovern and Worcester’s District Attorney, Joe D. Early, Jr. Pursuant to his interests regarding the Middle East and refugees, Alec studied in Amman, Jordan to research the Jordanian civil war and the resulting trauma and divide between Jordanians and Jordanians of Palestinian origin. Following graduation, he aspires to commission as an officer within the United States Marine Corps and afterward, earn an advanced degree and become a Foreign Service Officer within the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. Alec calls northern California home.

Both Grace and Alec received a $5,000 scholarship and mentoring on pathways into local, state, and federal government careers.

Clark Senior, Colleen Falconer is one of three PBK Boston Association Scholarship winners for the 2021-22 academic year.  Colleen will use the scholarship to fund her dual B.A. in Sociology and International Development & Social Change. She is currently completing an undergraduate honors thesis on sex work in the state of Rhode Island and will continue her education in Clark’s Accelerated Degree Program in Community Development & Planning. The PBK Boston Association sponsors an annual scholarship competition for undergraduate students enrolled in Massachusetts colleges and universities sheltering a Phi Beta Kappa chapter, including Harvard University, Williams College, and MIT. Learn more about the scholarship here.

Brendan Burgess is a double major in Political Science and Computer Science. Several faculty submitted recommendations for Brendan, citing not only his “ability to identify and confidence to pursue important questions and topics” such as little-explored national security issues, but also his active participation and leadership in the Clark Model United Nations and Competitive Computing Club, among many other expressions of outstanding intellectual engagement.

Previous winners of the PBK Sophomore Prize include Marissa Natale in 2015, a History major and holocaust and genocide studies concentrator; Andrew Bellesis in 2014, a biochemistry and molecular biology major and holocaust and genocide studies concentrator; and Yisrael Lattke, a chemistry major, who received our first prize in 2013. PBK Sophomore prize nominations are solicited from faculty at the end of the academic year and the prize is announced and awarded at the start of the following academic year (the beginning of the student’s junior year).

Odgerel Chintulga has won the 2017 PBK Boston Association scholarship. Odgerel is a junior majoring in environmental science with a minor in economics. She was recently featured in Clark Now for her LEEP project on the mining industry’s impact on the nomadic people of Khanbogd in her native Mongolia. Last year, Alicja Gancarz received the PBK Boston Association Scholarship. Learn more about the PBK Boston Association and their scholarship.

The PBK Sophomore Prize is awarded to an outstanding sophomore who has demonstrated a commitment to the rigorous inquiry encouraged by this honor society. The 2015 PBK Sophomore Prize was awarded to Marissa Natale for her exemplary work in History and Holocaust and Genocide Studies, where she weaves together exemplary scholarly rigor in the classroom with applications and projects beyond the classroom, as represented by her LEEP project on Holocaust money.

PBK Sophomore prizes are nominated at the conclusion of a student’s sophomore year and awarded at the beginning of their Junior year. Previous winners of the PBK Sophomore Prize include Andrew Bellesis in 2014, a biochemistry and molecular biology major and holocaust and genocide studies concentrator, and Yisrael Lattke, a chemistry major, who received our first prize in 2013. PBK Sophomore prize nominations are solicited from faculty at the end of the academic year and the prize is announced and awarded at the start of the following academic year (the beginning of the student’s junior year).

Clark students Shalyn Hopley ’14, Charlotte Turner ’14 and Austin Alexander ’13 were awarded writing internships with the national office of the Phi Beta Kappa Society in Washington, D.C. for which they prepared publishable articles for Phi Beta Kappa’s new site The Key Reporter.

“As an English major and soon-to-be college graduate, I have invested my time and money into the liberal arts, and as a typical college student, I spend plenty of time perusing the internet. Understandably then, any article that pronounces my path of studies to be ‘dead’ flashes bright red on my radar screen. When I saw Joseph Epstein’s article ‘Who Killed the Liberal Arts? And Why We Should Care’ in The Weekly Standard, I immediately bookmarked it…”

“Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 states: ‘No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.’ Forty years later, Title IX remains one of the most important legislative decisions regarding education in America…“

“In a recent article in The New York Times, ‘Muslims from Abroad Are Thriving at Catholic Colleges,’ Richard Pérez-Peña brings to light a new and interesting trend in American Catholic universities. Increasingly, students from the Muslim world intent on earning degrees in the United States are opting to attend faith-based institutions steeped in Christian values rather than secular schools. As a representative of the University of Dayton in Ohio reported to Pérez-Peña, that school’s Muslim population has increased more than six-fold in the last decade and features a much higher proportion of women…“

Aaron Foster Bresley knew music was his forte when he entered Clark, but when he contemplated actually majoring in music composition, he worried that “no one does that.”

He decided to follow his passion, however, and his facility in music lead to one success after another: at Clark, he was the Musical Director of numerous campus musicals, including Curtains and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee; was a Peer Learning Assistant, in which he was able to tutor students in musical concepts; and wrote various compositions, primarily for string quartets. Aaron’s sensitivity to the way people would hear his music lead him to produce winning pieces. As an army brat, Aaron had natural awareness and interest in the way people think, especially people of different cultures, which he explored through his varied coursework in international relations, economics, and French. This fall he is entering the California Institute of Arts to pursue his Master of Arts in music composition. One day he may pursue his Ph.D. in music composition so he can teach at the college level and continue to write music, in the way he feels his beloved professors in the Music Department at Clark imparted both their knowledge and talent to their students.

Growing up in Romania where she had specialized in foreign languages-bilingual in high school, Oana Chimina had long had diverse intellectual interests in foreign languages, history, politics, and literature, which she pursued at Clark through her major in International Relations and French.

Her serious engagement with her studies led to notable experiences abroad and at Clark. As a sophomore, she spent a semester in France at the University of Burgundy, studying French literature and culture, and at Clark, she started the European Students Association, as well as worked as a research assistant for professors in political science, and wrote honors theses in both International Relations and French. Her skill in language and politics culminated in a significant project supported through a Harrington Public Affairs Fellowship, in which she examined the effectiveness of the National against Trafficking Persons in Romania in hindering human trafficking. In recognition of her many successes, she was admitted to the political science honor society and awarded the Sallie R. Holthausen Prize for Excellence in International Relations and the J. Fannin King Prize for Excellence in French. During the summer she had a consulting internship with the International Data Corporation and a second internship with the Social Science Research Council, in a program on security in post-conflict societies coordinated by the London School of Economics. This fall she is attending Cambridge University in the UK where she is pursuing an M.Phil. in International Relations.

Alexis Lightner has parlayed her impressive academic background in communication and the innovation and entrepreneurship program to effect a real change in Clark’s campus community.

Earlier in her academic career at Clark, Alexis had held a prestigious internship in London where she wrote and published blog posts for ABC. Back at Clark, she has used her media and business savvy to further Clark’s mission of fostering the campus community. With the goals of reducing waste on campus, creating employment opportunities for students, and providing college students with a place to purchase inexpensive essentials, Alexis created a winning proposal for a neighborhood thrift store, which she brought to fruition. After taking first place in the U-REKA: Clark’s Big Idea contest, a campus-wide competition to benefit the Clark campus community, Alexis acquired the seed money for this project. The campus thrift store located on Main Street across from the campus square, has not only beautified a section of Main Street but serves both Clark students and its neighbors, who make up about fifty percent of the store’s clientele. The Society of Professional Communicators recognized Alexis’ achievements by awarding her the Elaine Cencak Memorial Scholarship Award. During the summer she had an internship with AFS USA, the non-profit study abroad organization, to help the organization develop its social media strategy, as well as a job with Intrinsic Consulting, a marketing firm. This fall, she is entering the fifth-year program in Masters of Science and Professional Communications to further her study.

Megan Mateer, inducted into Phi Beta Kappa in 2010, encompasses the academic excellence, as well as the breadth and depth of liberal arts study, representative of the honor society, Phi Beta Kappa.

She received a B.A. in Psychology in 2010 and is currently completing her fifth year in the M.B.A. program at Clark. As an undergraduate she realized the value in exploring a variety of intellectual avenues, taking courses in graphic design, gender studies, and international development. Her diverse studies culminated in her pursuing a final project in psychology that explored women and eating disorders.

She also pursued her broad intellectual interests through study abroad at the University of Cape Town, with an international program that focuses on service. While there, she participated in a number of service and research projects. She assisted twelfth graders with homework, providing them with a mentor, and the overtaxed teachers with additional help. She also created two research projects, one to determine a more nutritional food to be sold by local women in the community and her capstone research, which involved creating educational programs to increase more effective education for HIV prevention. Her awareness of the importance of local cultural values in creating successful social programs—one of the crucial lessons learned through the international and cultural focus of her studies at Clark—formed the basis of both these projects.

In her M.B.A. program, she hopes to maintain that focus through an emphasis on corporate social responsibility, concentrating on public accounting.

Andrew Romano
Amal Ahmed
Anna Walker
Annie Macbeth
Anthony Fantin
Artemiy Leonov
Becky Caswell Shacham
Ceci Bachana
Clara Mazzye
Courtney Campbell
Daina Faust
Emily Abney
Emily Hogue
Emma Holt
Flora Trost
Grace Dowling
Griffin Temple
Gyani Pradhan Wong Ah Sui
Hanna Lavenson
Hannah Russo
Jacqueline Faulise
Jens Peterson
Juliana Hall
Justinne Katigbak
Kateryna Potorocha
Katie Healey
Ksenia Smart
Leo Braun
Lily ten Berge
Lindsay Piscitelli
Matt O’connell-Vale
Naama Sarfati-Magill
Natasha Rivas
Nora Leifer
Nora Rueffer
Peyton Dauley
Ryle Jarvis
Sadie Kaim
Sadie Price-Elliott
Sarah Kersting-Mumm
Shanay Massimi
Shradha Birdika
Sophia Oomen-Lochtefeld
Sophie Guss
Sydney Kanzer
Taylor Mahoney
Tea Tane
Tsugumi Yamashita
Victoria Pastor
William Brown
Wynnie Gross
Xea Kirkland

Aanandita Bali | Abby Thompson | Alexandra J. Simmons | Alia Tang | Anna Kathryn Hodges | Apple Gould-Schultz | Audrey Salmons | Bea Gerber | Ben Wolff | Celia Welton | Chang Liu | Charlotte LeClair | Chau Duong | Chloe Carleton | Christina Rose Walcott | Diana Gonzalez | Elizabeth Rozmanith | Emery Letendre | Emma Theisen | Finnegan Wertz | Gaby DiPinto | Giordana Sena | Hannah Friend | Hannah McLeod | Hattie Carolan | Holly Gilson | Isabel Kelly | Isabelle Raskin | Jack McPadden | Jenna Hendrickx | Jessie Garbeil | Jill Cass | Kelsey Heyel | Kira Houston | Kristina Deverdzic | Liam Swiggard | Lilah Feitner | Lily Palmer | MacKenzie Johnson | Maggie Herlihy | Mahdi Boulila | Maisie Kramer | Matt Lee | Max Macort | Megan Freitag | Meghan Hines | Mischka Altucher | Natalya Loughrin | Noah Rowan | Raquel Jorge Fernandes| Rose Delogu | Sara Wheeler | Sarah Miller | Savannah Croft-Levin | Sindi Tane | Sophie Alienello | Talia Harlow | Tatiana Schmid

Melanie Adams | Nassim Ali Ahmad | Greg Amador | Caitlyn Angeletti | Sherry Assi | Amelia Balik | Henley Ballou | Anastasia Beirne-Meyer | Leah Brooks | Riley Buckjune | Giorgio Caripidis Soto | Jonas Davis | Emily Dean | Sierra DePalma | Abi DeRego | Domenica Dillon | Maya Egan | Colleen Falconer | Jeremy Francoeur | David Hanrahan | Alexander Hewes | Jade Hoang | Adam Jamal | Hallie Johnson | Jaime Joseph | Shoham Kapach | Sara Kashif | Sobia Khokhar | Iris Knowles | Kay Larkin | Claire Lawler | Thuy-Mi Le | Adam Liebell-McLean | Jacob Lonon | Ivana Lopez Nieves | Nicholas Lussier | Daria Manea | Christina Martin | Taylor Murphy | Joey Nguyen | Marimo Oka | Jay Papa | Luke Pound | Emma Pulizzi | Fatima Qutab | Gabi Schroer do Nascimento | Max Schweitzer | Eleanor Sienkiewicz | Kaila Skeet Browning | Noah Skole | Sam Snediker | Elaine Sowlat | Mia Swartz | Joseph Sziabowski | William Talbot | Chris Whittington | Jireh Williams | Zachary Zawila

Abby Souza | Allison Lee | Amy Chen | Anna Friberg | Brianna Lavelle | Camille Musson | Carly Bernstein | Chi Nguyen | Colin Farrington | Darya Blyednova | Dillon Prus | Drashhti Bilimoria | Eesha Kashif | Ethan Manley | Garren Kalter | Helena Redgate | Henry Severance | Jaime Smith | James Nightengale | Jane Thomas | Jay Verchin | Jocelyn Snyder | Jordan Blocher | Joshua Podolsky | Julia L’Esperance | Kas Green | Kayleigh Watson | Kirti Sinha | Koki Hayashi | Liana Shpani | Lukas Pomerville | Mahi Taban | Maya Ingram | Megan Plansky | Mikey Ippolito | Monica Sager | Morgan Dufour | Morgan Hylton | Nikita Kupko | Olivia Pozder | Priyanka Naithani | Rafael Levin | Sabrina Hallal | Sadie Murray | Sam Rubin | Sarah O’Brien | Sarah Reinbrecht | Sophia Kaplan | Tara Stein | Taylor Barbieri | Valeria Chavez | Victoria Beyer | Viena Murillo-Paredes

Alice Acciani | Nadav Battat | Nuhamin ‘Numi’ Berhanu | Lisa Bumpus | Will Clark | Tessa Collins | Ngu ‘Nathan’ Dang | Ruth Fuller | Anna Gates | Bailey Glenn | Mateo Gomez Ardila | Arianna Hall | Angelica Joa | Joseph Jung | Sophie Kelliher | Emma Kirkman-Davis | Azariah ‘Andrew’ Kurlantzick | Rachel Lloyd | Caitlin Louie | Rowen McAllister | Devin McBrayer | Kailey McIlwrath | Amer Macedonci | Carly Massino | Alana Merly | Viktoriya Minasyan | Rowan Moody | Emma Nagler | Ariana Nicholson | Michael O’Connor | Iryna Onasenko | Ellie Oslin | Margaret ‘Maggie’ Paul | Alejandra Rosselli Calderon | Cynthia Sellers | Karishma Sewsankar | Utkristaa Shrestha | Sophie Spiliotopoulos | Shelby Spohn | Jessica Strzempko | Trevor Tarnowski | Catalin Veghes | Sara Vera-Cruz | Tengquig ‘Jacky’ Wang | Henry Weiss | Elyse Wyatt | Xuemeng Zhang

Phil Jake Lam Yiew Foo Ah Heng | Burhan Ahmed | Eli Baldwin | Camille Bales | Anika Berger | Jessica Boulet | Leah Breiss | Charlotte Bresee | Iolanthe Brooks | Bradley Brownell | Kole Brownstein | Madeleine Buchman | Joseph Burke | Adina Cohen | Liliana Costa-Smith | Shayna Davis | Zoe DeGrazia | Padmini Dey | Savannah Dube | Ogechi Ezemma | Jason Fehrnstrom | Ariana Franklin | Liza French | Sydney Geer | Zaza Gelashvili | Alisa Gelfand | Halley Glier | Tracy Graham | Shafi Ifty | Saadman Islam | Kathryn Jensen | Brandon Lau Zelaya | Hyomin Lee | Lauren Liderman | Elizabeth Lloyd | Linnea Menin | Teodor Nicola-Antoniu | Maia Nikoladze | Daniel Oliveira | Alyssa Pelletier | Sydney Pepper | Camilo Posada Rodriguez | Gillian Rude | Maxwell Sacra | Julia Schroeder | Gyulnara Shakhalieva | Claire Shapton | Salma Shawa | Dania Simoun-Tkachenko | Andrew Thomas | Phat Tran | Kristen Truesdale | Kendra Walker | Yana Zubarev

Emilie Backer | Eli Berkowitz | Susanna Berman | Astha Bilimoria | Gianna Bizzarro | Katharine Courville | Sarah Cramer | Gordon Crean | Jacob Dinerman | Nicole Feinberg | Madeleine Louise Fontaine | Rose Gallogly | Delight Gavor | Devra Goldstein | Stephanie Grabowski | Connor Guerin | Eliana Hadjiandreou | Samuel Vladimir Highland | Natasha Hopley | Kimberly Johnson | Paraskevi Kambanis | Sasha Kohan | Samuel Kovaka | Aaron Kraft | Rebecca Kravetz | Zoe Lafrance-Armstrong | Kayla Landis | Jheanell Lumsden | Garrett Lynch | Nizar Naitlho | Hoang Viet Nguyen | Clara O’Rourke | Eric Pasay | Shivani Patel | Hannah Rosenblum | Kayli Schulz | Sanika Shah | Roei Shimony | Anna Spack | Binh Van Tang | Chelsea Viteri | Ying Ge Wang | Alaina Yonkers | Jessie Zelisko

El Mehdi Ainasse | Samantha Arsenault | Suzanne Birdsell | Mikayla Bobrow | Katherine Bogen | Amanda Brackett | David Carpino | Tyler Collins | Briana Cooney | Moriah Day | Patricia De Carvalho | Shannon Donnellan | Kevin Dunn | Zachary Fromson | Ronald Gerber | Joel Helander | Joseph Hersh | Michino Hisabayashi | April Hooper | Taylor Hopkins | Nicholas Huzsvai | Danielle Jacques | Emily Kates | Gaia Khairina | Andrea Levesque | Alyssa LoGrasso | Jennifer Manglass | Blaine McCarthy | Rebecca I. Miller** | Mikaela Monous | Keitaro Okura | Sarah Philbrick | Nicholas Porcella | Hannah Rush | Nicholas Sancho-Rosi | Lillian Schley | Robin Schwartz | Elizabeth Severson | Brianna Valois | Olivia Vande Griek | Mara Walton | Imogene Winkleman | Erin Wurtemberger | Cara Yacino | Hannah Yore | Kathleen Zayka

Cynthia Alonso | Sophia Anastasio | Tatiana Baglioni | Emma Baker | Miranda Bethune | Diane M. Boodrookas | Rose Burberry-Martin | Adrienne Cummings | Hoang Duong Trong | Lucas Earl | Casey Epstein | Allison Fichtelberg | Talia Fish | Kira Foley | Stefanie Gough | Matthew Grossman | Nina Hoey | Shalyn Hopley | Eleanor M. Hurd | Maria Jijon Nemalceff | Robert Kagan | William Kolschowsky | Lauren Koppel | Chelsea Kryspin | Cody Litchfield | Wyndham Maxwell | Alina Michelewicz | Samuel Nye | Ceylan I. Oymak | Evan Palmer | Jessica Poirier | John Preston | Zoe Ritter | Alison Russo | Chelsea Salmonsen | Anthony Saracino | Juliana Spahr | Cecelia Spencer | Abigail Stone | Matthew Thompson | Charlotte Turner | Kent Vorland | Xiandong Wang | Ilana Weiss | Kristin Withers | Jingjing Yang

Jessica A. Bisbee | Brady T. Burton | Benjamin C. Canner | Hana E. Chamoun | Natasha D. Cochran | Emma L. Craig | Franklin A. Eneh | Crystal Wen Xi Fam | Evan O. Foley | Francis F. Freedman | Matthew V. Furman | Arielle S. Ganem-Rosen | Christina M. Geller | Zoe S. Greenberg | Cara M. Gross | Ashley P. Hames | Dana E. Hanley | Casey L. Harrington | Jennifer B. Heim | April K. Herleikson | Kelsey A. Holdefehr | Caroline H. Johnson | Rose K. Kamsler | Alyssa C. Kogan | Magali A. Lemahieu | Catherine A. Lenis | Jun Ha Lyu | Matthew J. Manley | Christopher McCloskey | Olivia G. McGill | Allegra B. Mitchell | Andrea R. Moshier | Jasper S. Muse | Emily L. Newton | Margaret Nicholson | Shannon L. Palmer | Rebecca L. Paradis | Janet M. Scott | Emily J. Sturdivant | Arelia A. Sturgis | Michael P. Tierney | Ikuko Uchida | Marie-Claire H. Walters | Lauren G. Ziemer | Martha D. Ziemer | Samantha L. Zorn

Jenni Adams | Lauren Beaudin | Isabel Burgess | Sarah Carr | Jong Whan Choi | Spencer Curry | Maragret Federici | Jennifer Gaines | Daniel Gilbert | Devon Grayson-Wallace | Shayl Fiona Griffith | Tamar Gzirishvili | Abigail Johnson | Lisa Johnson | Aleksandra Kaszowska | Thaddeus Kelly | Megumi Koyama | Joseph Krahe | Jake Kramer | Julian Kronick | Breanna Lembitz | Hanlin Li | Katherine McGonagle | Katelyn McGrath | Sean Minahan | Elizabeth Mirabelli | Samuel Moody | Simone Palladino | Marko Radovic | Eric Riklin | Jessica Risman | Mariana Saculo | Sondra Saporta | Rachel Sensenig | Julia Sharoff | Andrew Shatz | Cara Slaby | Timothy Sossa | Marian Stacey | Lila Trowbridge | Joshua Yocum | Tegan Young | Curtis Wiemann

Jennifer R. Aballo | Aaron F. Bresley | Kayleigh R. Boothby | Gerard F. Boucher | Steven R. Brouillard | Kenneth R. Cabell | Nicholas J. Callender | Phoebe T. Cape | Alexandra D. Carter | Christopher A. Cesarini | Rebecca L. Chabot | Haoming Chang | Oana Chimina | Amy E. Donin | Julie A. Erthal | Amanda L.C. Fontaine | Rachael J. Furman | Hillary A. Gleason | Dylan I. Glotzer | Deanna L. Goldner | Benjamin H. Goldberg | Lily C. Hughes | Jill L. Johnson | Abigail R. Kaminski | Irma Karpaviciute | Sang A. Kim | Sylvie Lepeltier | Elizabeth A. Lightner | Jesse R. Mattleman | David R. Opp | Callista R. Perry | James P. Pooley | Emily J. Rouleau | Kate Saccone | Benjamin M. Seel | Margo L. Sheck | Ammar Ahmed Tareen | Natasha S. Tchamitchian | Jeffrey W. Van Steenbergen | Daniel M. Vladimer | Catherine E. Witschey | Darcy F. Young

Alicia Jean Alterio | Alicia Renee Andrade | Emily R. Bell | Lauren Danielle Bloomberg | Kristen Leigh Bokhan | Mikal Christensen Brotnov | Jason Carmignani | Yang Chen | Sunewan Chunhasuwan | Katherine MacKenzie Cody | Joseph Vincent DeMartino | Elizabeth Demsky | Di Deng | Tara Devara | Hannah Rachael Fine | Brian Hadler Finley | Victoria E. Fox | Catherine Elizabeth Gabis | David Patrick Glancy | Claire Griffin | Celina Roswitha Gris | Clara James | Juliana Kessler | Cynthia Reed Koegler | Brittany Laginhas | Cristina Legot | Kami Lane Lemke | Yingcun Lin | Katherine Ruth Matcovich | Marjorie M. Mateer | Erin Paige Marie McFadden | Julia Thorson McKinley | Rajesh Kamal Mehra | Eugeniu Victor Miculet | Erin Miller | Marissa Millman | Maya Kali Minter | Jacob Nathan | Andrew Ninnemann | Samantha Grace Palace | Julian Isaac Semiatin Park | Hannah Rose Perlmutter | Isaac Smith Selkow | Emma Faye Siemasko | Chad Michael Sirois | Julie Warchol | Jeremy Ross Weyl | Angela Lynn Woodmansee