Hi everyone! I'm a rising junior at Barnard College of Columbia University, where I am double majoring in Political Science and Human Rights, and minoring in French. This summer I'm researching about art reinstitution and its ethical and legal components. Some of my other interests include social work, human rights, and law. Please feel free to reach me at cd3442@barnard.edu
Hi everyone!
My name is Noel Ullom and I am a student at Barnard College studying Political Science and Theatre. While I am more generally fascinated by the fields of political theory, metaphysics, and theatre, I am interested in researching the influence of contrasting philosophies around free will on the queer liberation movement in Italy for my Laidlaw project.
I would love to connect with you all!
Reese Taylor is a rising junior majoring in Philosophy, History, and Human Rights on a pre-law track. As a Laidlaw Scholar, she spent her first summer researching the role of labor in the economic and social uplift of Black Americans in the wake of Reconstruction. She was selected to present this research at Johns Hopkins University, The University of Pennsylvania, and the Global Laidlaw Scholars Conference. In her second summer, Reese founded The Voices in Action Initiative which is a program developed to empower and mobilize youth voices by providing them skills and practice in speech and debate. She enacted the program in Nassau, Bahamas with sponsorship from both the Laidlaw Foundation and The Kiwanis Club of Nassau.
Hi, my name is Aleena Mehta and I am a sophomore at Barnard College, majoring in Economics with a minor in Political Science. I grew up in Jammu and Kashmir, India, and hence have always been fascinated by the field of geopolitics. My research at the Laidlaw Foundation would revolve around extrapolating a relationship between state sovereignty and civil rights violations in the Kashmir crisis. This includes understanding the threat to the autonomy and stability of non-state actors in periods of territorial conflicts while investigating the recent socio-economic developments in the region.
Hello! My name is Aimar Rosario Ávila and I am a third-year student at Barnard College majoring in Urban Studies with a concentration in psychology and a minor in education. I’m from Puerto Rico and my research aims to investigate how the categorization of social spaces can reflect an interplay of political, historic, and cognitive developments through an intersectional lens.
Although I am from Mexico City, I have lived abroad for most of my life in places such as London and São Paulo. Now, I am part of the Class of 2026 at Barnard College in New York, and my prospective majors are philosophy and economics. I am interested in understanding abstract concepts to then investigate their concrete manifestation in every-day life, hence the interdisciplinary nature of my research and leadership. Being the granddaughter of immigrants who fled from both the Spanish Civil War and the Cuban dictatorship, I am constantly drawn to the complexities of how people's identities, beliefs and economic realities shape their contribution to local communities. Ultimately, I am passionate about helping marginalised communities and contributing to a more egalitarian society as a whole.
I am a rising senior at Barnard studying history, concentrating on the history of empires and colonialism with specific interest in food history. I research how people, culture, and the environment interact through food.
My name is Hannah Ramsey (she/her), and I am a senior at Barnard College studying neuroscience and English, though my research is interdisciplinary in nature, drawing heavily from the fields of medical anthropology, sociology, and narrative medicine.
Currently, I am researching how clinicians' reliance on body composition indicators (BCIs) in health assessments may contribute to the stigmatization of bodies. My intention with this work is to illuminate how moral and aesthetic biases within healthcare teams can negatively influence patient outcomes as a result of the stigmatizing effects associated with body-centric paradigms of health promotion. The goal of this research is to begin conceiving alternative approaches to promoting patients' physical health and subjective well-being that are both body-affirming and size-agnostic.
Apart from this research, I also have personal and academic interests in creative writing, writing pedagogy, and advocacy as it relates to the neurodiversity movement. In my spare time, I enjoy writing poetry, playing guitar, and taking long walks outside!
I am interested in the fields of mechanobiology, biohybrid prosthetics, biophysics, Jungian psychology, and philosophy.
Recently in association with Laidlaw;
In Cornell University (N.Y, U.S.A.) I worked on curating an art book on biomechanics for charity to raise awareness in this field of science.
And in Trinity College Dublin (Ireland), we worked on developing a microphysiological model of the osteocytic network in the bone that can be used to better understand the (patho)physiology of bone using Direct Laser Writing technology using MLO-Y4 cell culture.
On the side;
In ETH Zürich (Switzerland), I was working on understanding bio-hybrid muscle actuators using C2C12 cell culture by amassing literature review, designing biobot unit, and conducting biocompatibility tests along with growing and differentiating muscle cells for further electrical stimulation.
At DogPatch Labs's Patch (Dublin, Ireland) I was experimenting with creating a start-up company to help amputees get affordable prosthetics.
On the (other) side;
I like to dance, write, and read anything I get my hands on; be it music, poetry, or even shampoo bottles.
Please feel free to contact me here or on LinkedIn for any discussions regarding the aforementioned topics!