STUDENT NEWS AND EVENTS

Recent awards and accomplishments:

  • PhD student and Fulbright Scholar Rafi Najam has been awarded the Robert S. McNamara Fellowship with the World Bank Development Economics Vice Presidency, Development Impact Evaluation (DIME) Department for 2023-24. 

  • MPP student Victoria Moreno has been awarded a 2022 John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship by the national Sea Grant program.

  • A new report for Partners for a Hunger Free Oregon, completed by PhD candidate Heather King, with analytical team of other OSU PhD students is being used to shape legislation currently under consideration in Oregon, 2021. 

  • PhD student Lontum "Shey" Nchadze was invited by the U.S. Department of State to participate on a panel with the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars under the theme “Ten Plus Ten: YALI and United States Look Back, and Ahead, Together.” Shey presented on the “Role of Research and Data in Effective Public Management.”

  • MPP student Tera Stegner has been awarded a 2021-22 Oregon Lottery Scholarship and a 2021-22 Philanthropic Educational Organization Scholarship.
  • PhD Student Tjroven Sievers has received a 2021-22 Portland State University Hatfield Fellowship with the Oregon Health Authority to work on the agency's DEI plans.
  • PhD student Rafael Felipe Silva Molina has received a 2021 Portland State University Summer Fellowship with the Transformation Center, Oregon Health Authority.
  • MPP student Shahinur Bashar has been awarded a 2021-22 Portland State University Hatfield Fellowship with Portland Metro.
  • MPP student Harry Blakeman has been awarded a 2021 Portland State University Summer Fellowship with the Oregon Advocacy Commissions Office.
  • Former MPP student and now PhD student Rafiuddin “Rafi” Najam has won first place for his article "Financing of Public Higher Education in Afghanistan: Public Opinion and Information Effects," by the Pacific Chapter of American Association for Public Opinion Research, 2020.

  • PhD student Ricardo de Ycaza has been awarded a Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship for International Research (SYLFF) for his research on the Blue Economy in Central and South America (2020-21)

  • MPP student and Russian Fulbright Scholar Ingrid Banshchikov received an Edmund S. Muskie Graduate Fellowship, University of Minnesota (2020). 

  • MPP student Victoria Williams received a award by the NOAA Living Marine Resources Cooperative Science Center to fund her research "Understanding Adaptive Capacity:  An Analysis of Community Perceptions and Policy Responses to Ocean Acidification and Other Marine Stressors on the West Coast" (2020-21). 

  • PhD student Cassy Inman was awarded a 2020-21 OSU Provost's Scholarship.

  • MPP students Victoria Williams, Victoria Venable, and Erin Kanzig participated in the 2020 NASPAA Batten Competition at the Pepperdine University site. Our students finished first, second and fourth at the Pepperdine University site (Victoria Williams on the first place team, Erin Danzig on the second place team, and Victoria Venable on the fourth place team). https://nbsims.org/2020-site-winning-teams/  Victoria Williams' team also won second place in the National 2020 NASPAA Batten Competition.

  • Johannah Hamilton has been elected to serve as the Graduate Student Vice President and is a MANRRS National Officer for the 2019-20 year. MANRRS is a non-profit organization promoting academic and professional advancement by powering minorities in agriculture, natural resources, and related sciences.

  • MPP alum Daniel Gray and Professor David Bernell just published “Tree Hugging Utilities? The Politics of Phasing out Coal and the Unusual Alliance that Passed Oregon’s Clean Energy Transition Law, in Energy Research and Social Science (2020).

  • MPP student Victoria Williams has been awarded a graduate research fellowship with the NOAA Living Marine Resources Cooperative Science Center (2019-22).

  • MPP student Jasmine King has been awarded a NSF National Research Traineeship Fellowship with the "Risk and Uncertainty Quantification in Marine Science and Policy" at Oregon State University (2019-21).

  • PhD student Sena Pradipta was selected as a Fellow for the 2019 Summer Institute on Sustainability and Energy program at the University of Illinois, Chicago.

  • MPP alumnus and current PhD student at George Mason University Muhammad Salar Khan recently published an article with Professors Paul Thompson and Victor Tremblay: "Marijuana Tax Incidence, Stockpiling, and Cross Border Substitution" in the journal International Tax and Public Finance (July, 2019).

  • MPP student Adrian Laufer received a 2019-20 Coastal Management Fellowship with the Oregon Coastal Management Program.

  • MPP student Heather Mae Moline was selected to participate in the 2019 National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Advanced Study Program (ASP) Colloquium.

  • MPP student Harry Noone published his article "Two-Level Games and the Policy Process: Assessing Domestic-Foreign Policy Linkage Theory" in World Affairs, April, 2019.

  • PhD student Gautam Anand has been selected for the 2019-20 Policy Communications Program, implemented by the Population Reference Bureau and the African Institute for Development Policy. He will attend a one week Summer Institute in Lilongwe, Malawi, 2019. Gautam was also awarded a Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship for International Research (SYLFF) for his research health policy research in India (2019-20).

  • MPP student Michelle Steinhebel was elected to the Lebanon City Council (Oregon) during the November 2018 election. 

  • PhD student Patricia Teresa Fernandez Guajardo has received a fellowship from the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology for 2018 to 2020.

  • MPP student Harry Noone won second place for the 2018 PAPOR (Pacific Chapter of the American Association for Public Opinion Research) student paper competition with his paper "Measuring Public Attitudes Toward National Security Whistleblowers."

  • MPP and PhD students Rebecca Langer, Warda Ajaz, Zehra Gardezi, Allison Daniels, Greg Stelmach, Heather Moline, Angela Lavado, Patricia Teresa Fernandez Guajardo, Dolores Vazquez, Stuty Maskey, and Ben Wickizer, presented their OPAL policy clinic research "Environmental “Exploring the Food-Water-Energy Nexus: Public Perceptions, Policy Preferences, Environmental Beliefs, and Group Identity,” at the Pacific Northwest Political Science Association 2018 Meetings, Bend, Oregon, November 9, 2018.

  • MPP student Alexa Diaz is the recipient Portland WTS (Women's Transportation Seminar) Gail Achterman Leadership scholarship for 2018-19.

  • PhD student Warda Ajaz has published her article "Resilience, Environmental Concern, or Energy Democracy? A Panel Data Analysis of Microgrid Adoption in the United States" in Energy Research and Social Science (March 2019, vol. 49, pp. 26-35).

Other student events:
  • Our Fall 2019 Field Trip at the Coast:
  • MPP Students Erin Kanzig and Rafiuddin Najam represented OSU at the February 2019 NASPAA-Batten simulation competition in San Francisco:

  • Our Fall 2018 Orientation at the Coast:
  • Allison Daniel presented her research at the Energy Conference at Boise State University, September 2018. This is a comparative study of food-water-energy (FWE) policies and climate change beliefs among residents of Oregon, Washington, California, and Idaho. The goal of this survey is to develop a better understanding of FWE trade-offs in order to build integrated policies that address the nexus in the future. My focus is on identifying the political will of the public in order to inform the policy process regarding the FWE nexus.
  • MPP and PhD students at the Energy Conference at Boise State University, September 2018:
  • Our 2018 MPP Graduates at the End of Year Party:
  • Our PhD students attended the 2018 Midwest Political Science Association conference in Chicago.

  • MPP Graduates at the OSU Alumni Happy Hour in Washington, DC with President Ed Ray