CLASS OF 2018

Micheal Brown - Houston, TX

Micheal was very active during high school, and through the summer after his senior year, he mentored youth in programs run by the World Youth Foundation and SWAG To College. Micheal was awarded the Princeton Prize in Race Relations, Coca-Cola Scholarship, Gates Scholarship, GE-Reagan Scholarship, National Horatio Alger Scholarship, Bryan Cameron Scholarship, and Ron Brown Scholarship and was named a U.S. Presidential Scholar. Micheal was featured in CNN, the Washington Post, and the New York Times for acceptance into twenty top-tier schools. After graduating with an International Baccalaureate Diploma, Micheal spent his summer working remotely for the Ron Brown Scholars Program and completed a service trip in the Dominican Republic.  Micheal also interned at Vinson & Elkins LLP in Houston. Micheal currently studies economics at Stanford University, is involved in many student organizations there, volunteers with local organizations there, and works as a Research Assistant. 

In honor of Janice Brown (Micheal's late grandmother)

David Bruno - Orlando, FL

David Bruno is a member of the graduating Class of 2018 from William R Boone High School in Orlando, FL. In addition to his strong academics, Mr. Bruno has a passion for service and the political system.  Active in his school’s Key Club, Debate Team, and Student Government, to name a few, he is also an active volunteer for Teen Court and the Florida Honor Law Society.  David entered Harvard University in the Fall of 2018.

In honor of Lejuste and Marlene Bruno (parents)

Bridger Gordon - Whitewood, SD

Bridger is a freshman at Harvard College, studying Economics and Statistics. He writes for the Harvard Crimson, covering the "Boston, the Commonwealth, and Harvard Relations” beat, and he also writes for the Harvard Political Review, covering contemporary American political trends and issues. Bridger joined the Harvard Financial Analysts Club, and his team won the 2018 HFAC Stock Pitch Competition. He is on the Development Team for the Harvard Open Data Project, and plays intramural sports for his dorm (Lionel). When not working on a project for his classes or extracurriculars, Bridger is reading a book or playing foosball in the Smith Center with his friends.

In honor of Bruce and Kindra Gordon (parents)

Anne Lee - Sammamish, WA

Anne is currently at Stanford University and loves it a great deal.  Since the beginning of the school year, Anne has been interning at a startup developing an intelligent home lighting system.   She is also involved with ASES, one of Stanford's (many) entrepreneurship clubs. The club is currently planning an event connecting VCs with Stanford startups, and Anne will be in Seattle for TigerLaunch, Princeton's entrepreneurship pitch competition. Also, Anne recently joined the Stanford Farmers club to learn more about sustainable agriculture. As of now, she is planning to study Computer Science with a minor in Sustainability. This summer, Anne will be back in Seattle at Microsoft.

In honor of Mr. Mike Town (Mentor and Environmental Engineering & Sustainable Design Teacher)

David Wang Ma - Lexington, KY

At Harvard, David is heavily involved with service and advocacy as an officer in the Phillips Brooks House Association and director of the Boston Refugee Youth Enrichment program. He continues to play violin in orchestra and conducts computational biology research. He is also an associate in the Harvard College Consulting Group and a freshmen representative on councils for service and sustainability. David is deciding between concentrating in Computer Science, Statistics, or Linguistics.

In honor of Zhangliang Ma and Xuebing Wang (parents)

Sahar Mohammadzadeh - Lexington, KY

Sahar Mohammadzadeh is a member of the graduating Class of 2018 from Paul Laurence Dunbar High School in Lexington, KY.  In addition to her strong academics, Miss Mohammadzadeh has a passion for education, politics, and public speaking.  As captain of Speech and Debate, Student Council President, and Captain of the Swim & Dive team, she was also President of the Dunbar Cultural Society and Founder of the Grassroots Giving Garden.  Additionally, Sahar is an Executive Student Director and Postsecondary Committee Chair of the Prichard Committee Student Voice Team to improve college readiness across her state.  Sahar entered Harvard in the Fall of 2018.

In honor of Sepideh Pourazima and Hamid Mohammadzadeh (parents)

Trisha Prabhu - Naperville, IL

Trisha Prabhu is a first-year student at Harvard College in Cambridge, MA. Trisha is the Founder and CEO of ReThink, a social venture that is working to stop online hate before it happens. To date, ReThink has reached millions of students and 1500 schools internationally. ReThink has also been recognized by the U.S. State Department, The White House, and Stanford, and was featured on ABC's Shark Tank. ReThink is also a member of Harvard's Venture Incubation Program and a current semi-finalist for the Harvard President's Innovation Challenge. Trisha has spread the message to "ReThink" online hate on 4 TEDx and 5 TED stages, and was selected as a Global Teen Leader by the We Are Family Foundation. At Harvard, Trisha is the Founder and President of SoGal Cambridge, an initiative focused on helping diverse entrepreneurs and innovators achieve her dreams. Trisha also contributes to Harvard's Social Innovation Collaborative, Harvard Model Congress, and Harvard Model United Nations. Outside of Harvard, Trisha also volunteers her time as a Director of Curriculum/Partnerships at Commit2Change, an organization working to empower orphaned women in India. Trisha currently serves as Youth Governor of the State of Illinois - the first female YG in 28 years - and is passionate about public service.

In honor of Mrs. Shantha Sundari (grandmother) for instilling in her the courage to stand up for the voiceless.

Margaret Richey - Charlottesville, VA

Meg Richey is a member of the graduating Class of 2018 from Western Albemarle in Charlottesville, VA. She is currently a freshman at Stanford University, where she plans to major in Symbolic Systems. In addition to her strong academics, Miss Richey has a passion for technological innovation, entrepreneurship, and women in STEM. Meg is involved in Cap and Gown, a prestigious women’s leadership club on campus. While a student at Western Albemarle High School in Crozet, Virginia, Meg was on the research team at the University of Virginia Biomedical Design Lab where her efforts were focused on developing custom solutions for pediatric patients suffering from long-term illnesses. Margaret is an ANN, Inc. and Vital Voices HERlead Fellow and recently received a grant to continue her work to encourage women in STEM. She was the Emcee and the Facilitator for Women in Entrepreneurship for the 2017 Tom Tom Festival Youth Summit, she was a conference organizer and seminar instructor at CAPWIC, and she has spoken on the panel at the Virginia Film Festival that featured the film She Started It. In 2017, Meg was an Intel International Science and Engineering Fair Finalist and she developed a patent pending wearable that is designed to reduce the occurrence of diabetic foot ulcers and related deaths and amputations. Miss Richey was one of six high school students nationally chosen by PepsiCo and 21st Century Fox as the next generation of female leaders in STEM. Meg’s favorite hobbies are swing dancing and scuba diving while hunting lionfish, which are an invasive species in the Atlantic. Meg worked for the Department of Defense in the summer of 2018 and will be working for Booz Allen Hamilton in the summer of 2019.

In honor of Zoë Padrón (teacher)

Naomi See - St. Louis, MO

Naomi See is currently a Freshman at the University of Washington in Seattle studying Architecture and Urban Design. In her first year of college she has become involved in a myriad of programs that have furthered her previous goals and introduced her to new opportunities for growth. Within her school, Naomi has become involved in several labs including the Urban Ecology and Green Futures lab, where she is exploring eco-evolutionary dynamics in urban systems and the intersection of the natural and built environment. Naomi has also done work with Design for America, a student organization where she is working to design affordable housing for people who have a loss of hearing and sight. In the City of Seattle, Naomi has become involved with the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods, working to bring urban food systems to mixed income migrant neighborhoods. Towards the end of Winter Quarter, she began an internship as a Development Coordinator at the Low-Income Housing Institute, an organization working towards innovation solutions and progressive reform in public housing. This upcoming summer Naomi will be back and forth between San Francisco and the Netherlands working with Goudappel, a firm bringing urban design technology for accessibility and efficiency to the Bay area, with professors from her university.   

In honor of Sr. Barbara Thomas (President of Cor Jesu Academy)

Aditya Sidapara - Phoenix, AZ

Adi is studying computer science and public policy at Stanford University. He is a part of the Club Polo team, Venture Capital Club, and CS + Social Good. When he is not in class or working on homework, you can find him on the ranch riding horses or in the engineering buildings working on product development for various social good projects. This coming summer, he will be working at Microsoft in Redmond, WA. 

In honor of Anjana and Vraj Sidapara (parents)

Harrison Snowden - Ponte Vedra Beach, FL

Harrison is a junior at Princeton University majoring in Operations Research and Financial Engineering with minors in Statistics and Machine Learning, Engineering and Management Systems, Computer Science, and Finance. At school, he is the president of the Princeton Reform Jewish student community and is responsible for planning and leading Shabbat services every Friday night. He is also an officer of Tigers for Israel and a StandWithUs fellow, two non-partisan groups which aim to engage college students and advocate on behalf of the state of Israel. Harrison is an Orange Key Campus Tour Guide, an officer of the Princeton Charter Club, and an active member of Tiger Investments, a student-run investment club focusing on financial education and investment. Harrison’s favorite activity on campus, however, is Challah for Hunger; as a member, Harrison braids, bakes, and sells challah to fundraise for three local charities. He thinks his challah is the best challah because he always adds extra chocolate chips. For fun, Harrison has enjoyed playing on the club flag football team, dog walking for local Princeton residents, and volunteering with Academic Success Today, an organization which pairs Princeton students with low-income middle and high school students in need of tutoring.

In honor of Todd and Catherine Snowden (parents and role models)

Zoya Surani - Corpus Christi, TX

Zoya Surani is a freshman at Harvard University who hopes to concentrate in Human Evolutionary Biology while fulfilling her premed requirements. Apart from the time she spends rethinking her courseload, she conducts CPR/AED/First Aid certification courses as a Red Cross instructor, goes to Tufts Floating Hospital as a volunteer director to make crafts filled with sunshine and happiness with the kids (through Project Sunshine), prepares for Camp Kesem in the summer, and also works as a tour guide at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. She hopes to stay in Boston for the summer as either an RA for the Harvard Summer School students, a researcher at the Lichtman lab to continue modeling the system of neural networks, or work with the Angiogenesis Foundation to continue finding cures to diseases through angiogenesis-based medicine.

In honor of Sara and Saherish Surani (sisters)

Benjamin Trapp - Cincinnati, OH

Other than surviving his course load this year, last semester Benjamin became a guide in GW’s only outdoor organization, GW TRAiLS. This position has given him the opportunity to lead day hikes and backpacking trips in the nearby Appalachian Mountains in Maryland and Virginia and expose members from the community to the great outdoors. This semester Benjamin is training to become a Domestic Violence Liaison with the DC Metropolitan Police Department where he will be responding to domestic violence and sexual assault calls and offering Spanish to English translations, onsite counseling, and providing resource information to victims. This summer Bridger is also excited to be working in the Hamilton County Prosecutor’s office with the Chief of detectives on criminal investigations. 

In honor of Patricia Luehrmann (Spanish teacher and close friend)

Vinjai Vale - Exeter, NH

Vinjai Vale is currently a freshman at Stanford University and was a member of the graduating Class of 2018 from Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, NH.  Mr. Vale has a passion for scientific discovery, intellectual curiosity, and maximizing the potential of his peers.  He credits his love for problem-solving to his unconventional homeschooling background.  He co-invented IntentSense, a prosthetic control system for finger amputees, and published his first peer-reviewed paper while he was in middle school.  At Exeter, Vinjai co-headed the Math, Computing, Physics, and Robotics Outreach clubs.  He spearheaded an annual 48-hour Puzzle Hunt and co-founded hackNEHS, a high-school hackathon in the Greater Boston area.  Additionally, Mr. Vale attended the Research Science Institute at MIT and co-authored a book on algebra and number theory.  He is currently pursuing degrees in mathematics and computer science at Stanford.  Vinjai spends his free time climbing, meditating, and working on AI research to improve healthcare.

In honor of Sara and Rajesh Vale (parents)

Rachel Zoneraich - Scottsdale, AZ

Rachel Zoneraich is a junior at the University of Pennsylvania in the Jerome Fisher Program in Management & Technology (M&T). She is pursuing dual degrees in Computer Science Engineering and Finance in Wharton. At UPenn, Rachel serves on the Management and Technology Board and is the Professional Development Chair in Theta Tau, an engineering fraternity. Rachel is passionate about LATAM socioeconomics, and has spent extensive time in Argentina and Colombia learning about their business sectors and meeting with their political leaders. Rachel is also interested in the intersection of healthcare and technology, particularly in the realm of genomics. In her free time, Rachel loves to hike, paint, explore the Philadelphia food scene, and travel.

In honor of Beth and Nathaniel Zoneraich (parents)