Fellowships after the Shansi Fellowship
Celebrating Fulbright and Erasmus Mundus Awards
We are proud to share that three fellows from our ‘24-’26 Shansi Fellowship cohort have been selected to pursue their Masters degrees abroad through the Fulbright and Erasmus Mundus Programs. Sophie Minoosh Bernstein ‘22, who recently completed her fellowship at Keystone Foundation, India, will be starting a Joint Masters in Environmental Sciences, Policy and Management (MESPOM), operated by four leading European Universities and 11 partners around the world via the Erasmus Mundus program. Nissa Berle ‘24 who taught at Shanxi Agricultural University, China, will begin their Masters of Disaster & Emergency Management (MDEM) at York University in Ontario, sponsored by the Canada-US Fulbright Program. Sophie Qano ‘24 who worked at UNITAR, ANT-Hiroshima, and Green Legacy Hiroshima, Japan, will be pursuing the Social Psychology of Transformation (SPOT) Joint Erasmus Mundus Master Programme.
After working with the action-based organization Keystone Foundation, Sophie Minoosh Bernstein wanted to use science, policy, and management to understand and drive the choices behind impactful environmental decisions. Sophie will be studying at Central European University in Austria, University of the Aegean in Greece, and Lund University in Sweden on a fully funded scholarship from Erasmus Mundus. This program balances science with business management. She is excited to study land and water ecosystems, environmental management, waste and land management, sustainability and business value creation, and GIS/modeling tools.
Sophie’s time at Keystone Foundation as a Shansi Fellow informed her choice to pursue this Masters degree. After two years of research before her fellowship, her hands-on field experience with restoration monitoring at Keystone bridged the gap between theory and practice, showing exactly how research informs successful project implementation. Her experience engaging with various Adivasi (indigenous) tribes and understanding their distinct needs has prepared Sophie to work with diverse communities across the globe, always factoring in a group’s cultural background and grounded perspectives. She said, “the opportunity to be a Shansi Fellow has changed my life and has prepared me for a lifetime of meaningful international experiences.” Sophie is excited to take what she has learned as a Shansi Fellow and apply it to her studies in Europe.
Nissa Berle chose the MDEM program at York University because of eagerness to move into an impactful profession. Nissa is drawn to hands-on, action-based work in the field of Disaster & Emergency Management and is elated to have received full financial support from the Fulbright program to complete their Masters. Their course work will be varied, including psychology, sociology, and a practicum course with an internship. This will equip Nissa with the skills required to prepare for, mitigate, respond to, and recover from local, national and international disasters and emergencies. Nissa stresses that the Shansi Fellowship inspired them to continue their experience abroad and stated that “Shansi gave me the unconditional support and confidence to explore every opportunity in any country and find what fit my values and goals best.”
Among Nissa’s inspirations to pursue Disaster & Emergency Management was a trip to Banda Aceh, another Shansi site, where they visited the Aceh Tsunami Museum. This museum pays tribute to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami disaster, serves as an educational center, and offers emergency disaster shelter in case the area is ever hit by a tsunami again. Having experienced severe flooding in their Tennessee home when they were eight years old, Nissa was particularly moved by the Aceh Tsunami Museum and found many connections between the two disasters. Although these floods were continents apart from each other, Nissa understood that some of the “emotions and experiences can be similar” across cultures when disaster hits. Following a visit to Banda Aceh, Nissa was deeply moved by the critical role of international aid in addressing the escalating climate crisis, inspiring them to dedicate their efforts to cross-border humanitarian work.
Sophie Qano will be pursuing the Social Psychology of Transformation (SPOT) Joint Erasmus Mundus Master Programme. Over the course of two years, she will study transformative leadership, conflict and cooperation, and environmental psychology at universities in Germany, Portugal, and Italy. Sophie will also have the opportunity to write her dissertation and complete an internship in a Balkan country of her choice. She hopes to do so in Albania, where her father grew up.
Working at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), Green Legacy Hiroshima, and ANT-Hiroshima has given Sophie opportunities to see how change is implemented at both local and global scales through intergovernmental, pro bono, and NGO models. Sophie shares that “my experiences with Shansi furthered my interest in how people are shaped by their environments, and how environmental contexts can promote positive social change.” Sophie hopes to build on these professional experiences through her graduate studies and future research by exploring how natural and built environments influence pro-environmental and peacebuilding behavior.
Shansi applauds the dedication of our alumni to deepening mutual respect and understanding internationally as they pursue higher education abroad. We wish Sophie Minoosh Bernstein, Nissa Berle, and Sophie Qano all the best on their new adventures and we are eager to see what they accomplish in the future.