Four students have been nominated by the College to travel far and wide to investigate cultures around the globe.
For the national Watson Fellowship competition, the College selected seniors Jessica Koski, Tara Morin, Monica Guzmán, and Selena McMahan to advance to the next round. The students' intended projects include handicrafts, Hollywood, work with Clowns Without Borders, and pilgrimages.
Watson Fellowships allow graduating seniors to spend a year abroad working on a self-designed project. Each student's independent project focuses on an area of study of particular interest to the applicant. Projects allow for introspection and exploration while fostering international awareness. Each year the Thomas J. Watson Foundation awards 50 fellowships of $22,000 each to students. Bowdoin is allowed to nominate up to four students each year.
According to Director of the Career Planning Center and Director of Fellowships and Scholarships Anne Shields, Bowdoin nominees have had great success in competing for the Watson Fellowship.
"We've done very well," she said. "We've typically had one or two candidates each year go on to receive a reward, and a couple of years ago, we had three candidates win awards."
This year, 26 students applied for the fellowship, and after interviews and extensive review, the Bowdoin committee nominated Koski, Morin, Guzmán, and McMahan.
Koski's project is titled "From Heart and Hand: The Politics and Potential of Handicraft Production." Koski hopes to visit Ireland and countries in South America, where she will learn handicrafts like weaving and knitting from native women while observing how these crafts work to preserve indigenous tradition. Women can sell the handicrafts they create to help support their families and take some of the economic pressure off of men.
"I want to examine how this source of income affects women's relationship with the community," said Koski.
Koski drew her inspiration for this project from her love of knitting.
"I've always had a passion for the arts since I was a little kid, but I had to push it aside for academics," she said. "I took up knitting in college, and I love it!"
Guzmán's project focuses on how Hollywood has influenced other countries' perceptions of the United States. She hopes to interview moviemakers and moviegoers in Brazil, Egypt, France, and India. Guzmán has spent time in Spain and Peru where she has seen hints of Hollywood's impact abroad.
Like Koski's project, Guzmán's will allow her to learn about foreign culture while exploring one of her passions.
"I've been a big movie fan my entire life," said Guzmán. "[The Watson Fellowship] allows you to do what you love and figure out what really interests you."
Morin, a Religion major, plans to travel to Marian apparition sites in South America, Europe, and Japan. Through interviews with pilgrims, Morin will try to find out if people have come to these sites seeking spiritual or physical healing. At the end of the project, she will write an ethnographic report based on the accounts of these pilgrims.
"I'm excited to hear their stories and to find out what has brought them to these places," she said.
McMahan has loved participating in and watching performances all of her life, and since her sophomore year, she has taken workshops in clowning. McMahan's proposed project would allow her to put her talents and clown training to good use abroad. She hopes to work for an international program like Clowns Without Borders to help individuals work through personal traumas.
In the personal statement she wrote as part of her Watson application, McMahan stated, "My questions will focus on the nature of the artist-audience interaction and how performance affects social change. Because of the magic and delight of the work, these questions that can sometimes become analytic and stuffy will remain rooted in real practice, delight and passion."