Rollins

11 Rollins Students Selected for U.N.-backed Millennium Fellowship

August 29, 2019

By Audrey St. Clair ’03

Students help local villagers carry building equipment in Tanzania.
On a field study to Tanzania, students learned firsthand about what’s really involved in community development.Photo by Scott Cook.

For the second consecutive year, Rollins is among an exclusive group of colleges selected to participate in the prestigious leadership development program, which challenges students to address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

A cohort of 11 Rollins students has been selected to participate in the 2019 Millennium Fellowship, a prestigious leadership development program that empowers students to advance the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on campus and in their communities. Rollins was one of just 30 campuses worldwide selected to host the global pilot program in 2018.

Students from 1,209 campuses across 135 nations applied to the highly selective fellowship, which was launched last year by the United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) initiative and the Millennium Campus Network (MCN).

From August through December, Rollins Millennium Fellows will take action to help implement some of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals that the U.N. adopted in 2015 to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all. The goals range from clean water and affordable clean energy to quality education and responsible consumption. Millennium Fellows’ projects are projected to positively impact the lives of more than 970,000 people worldwide.

In their fellowship applications, students were asked to propose a project that would advance at least one U.N. Sustainable Development Goal and one UNAI principle. Projects include everything from research and documentary filmmaking to running a social enterprise and leading campus-wide initiatives. As the faculty advisor for the Social Impact Hub, political science professor Dan Chong will work closely with the cohort on developing and implementing their individual projects.

Four of the 2019 U.N. Millennium Fellows
From left: Isaac Gorres ’20, Aditya Das ’22, Brian Mahanpour ’20, and Eliane Heller ’21 are among Rollins’ 11 2019 Millennium Fellows.

“Rollins College stands out as one of the most committed university communities committed to social impact in the world,” says Sam Vaghar, MCN executive director and co-founder. “This extends from the students to the faculty and administration that strongly advocate for them. I have personally seen the extraordinary passion, commitment, and follow-through present in this community, and it is exciting and fitting to see Rollins selected to host Millennium Fellows on campus for another year.”

In addition to Millennium Fellowship sessions on campus this year, there will be webinars with sector leaders from the United Nations and the Gates Foundation along with collaboration from Howard W. Buffett, whose new book, Social Value Investing, has provided content for the fellowship curriculum.

“Our Millennium Fellows will leverage their Rollins education by engaging in global challenges such as educational inequality, sustainability, human rights, and access to health,” says Micki Meyer, Lord Family Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs-Community. “The U.N. Sustainability Goals provide students with a framework to direct their commitment to change, and we’re excited to see how they learn and grow from this leadership opportunity.”

2019 Millennium Fellows at Rollins

  • Farahana Cajuste ’21
  • Brittany Chaney ’21
  • Aditya Das ’22
  • Wyatt Deihl ’21
  • Jiayi Ding ’21
  • Isaac Gorres ’20
  • Eliane Heller ’21
  • Dahlia Lilleslatten ’20
  • Brian Mahanpour ’20
  • Brunella Roncetti ’21
  • Ye Wong ’21
Two students walking through campus.

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