The 2024 Winners of the Newman Exploration Travel Awards
Washington University Libraries are thrilled to announce the winners of this year’s Newman Exploration Travel Fund Award.
The NEXT Award program is intended to support Washington University students, faculty, and staff who wish to explore this vast world. Travel is a valued means to expand one’s horizons and inspire growth, excellence, and innovation while pursuing both personal and professional goals.
A total of eight applicants won the 2024 NEXT awards. Awardees include undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, and staff members.
Undergraduate student winners
Ava Giere is an Arts & Sciences student, majoring in comparative literature and political science with a minor in English. She will travel to the United Kingdom, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, and Estonia to do a comparative study of their democratic structures and systems of governance.
Antoinette Manteau is majoring in the Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology program and history with a minor in architecture. She will visit Quebec City in Canada and regions in France to explore French-speaking communities globally, from two perspectives: minority French speakers in majority English areas and minority non-French speakers within primarily French–speaking areas.
graduate student winners
Muad Al Juhany is studying in the JSD program at the School of Law. He will travel to American cities with Arabic names such as Medina, Ohio, Mecca, California, and Cordoba, California, among other places. Al Juhany’s project aims to document and critically assess the impact of Arabic names, symbols, and cultural practices on selected U.S. cities’ social and cultural identities.
Tyler Cargill is a PhD candidate in Energy, Environmental, and Chemical Engineering. He will travel to various places in Tanzania and Kenya to reconnect with the Swahili language and explore the historical production and reconceptualization of textiles by East Africans.
Faculty winners
Stan Braude, professor of biology and environmental studies, will visit Oxford and Cambridge, and other places in the UK, tracing the journey of Frederick Law Olmstead, who is known as the father of landscape architecture and crafted the first plan for the WashU campus in 1895. Braude will explore England’s parks, gardens, and university campuses to understand Olmstead’s aesthetic, which will inspire the design of green spaces around the new Arts & Sciences building west of Olin Library.
Jennifer Colten is a photographer and senior lecturer at the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts. She will travel to the Republic of Georgia to study and photograph ancient darbazi dwellings and the surrounding landscapes to illuminate their significance through history and the present day.
staff winners
Madeleine Frank is a science writer in the Department of Biology. She will explore American landscapes for a book project.
Katelyn McConnell is a project manager in the Office of the Provost. She will travel to different cities in Germany to understand their history and impact on her grandmother’s life and experiences before she immigrated to America.