Grants Fund Meaningful Summer Work

Nine Groton students are immersing themselves in intensive projects around the world this summer, thanks to generous grants designed to support extracurricular study.

They are pursuing a wide range of interests—working with the homeless in New York City, researching a respiratory illness in Beijing, studying the effects of technology on Mongolian women, and tracking endangered snakes.

They are teaching orphans in Vietnam, sharing art with the intellectually disabled, motivating children in India to stay in school, promoting oral hygiene in rural Mexico, and helping at a summer school in Newark, New Jersey.

Five students received grants from established Groton School funds—the John Endicott Lawrence 1927 Global Issues Scholars Fund, the George H.P. Dwight 1945 Internship Fund, and the Groton Opportunity for Leadership Development (G.O.L.D.) Fund. Four additional students received grants from the Parents’ Independent School Network (PIN).

Nena Atkinson ’16 and Anna Nicholson ’16 were awarded grants from the John Endicott Lawrence 1927 Global Issues Scholars Fund. Nena’ is is studying the effects of technology and media on Mongolian women and girls; she is working with Groton alumna Augusta Thomson ’06, a Fulbright Scholar based in Ladakh, India. (Nena is keeping a blog about her experience.) Anna is using her Lawrence Fund grant to do research at a Beijing hospital about a rare respiratory disease.

Logan Deming ’16 won a grant from the George H.P. Dwight 1945 Internship Fund; she is studying the effect of services for the homeless, working with Cathedral Community Cares, a program at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City. The Dwight Fund specifically supports internships at service organizations in the New York area.

Two students—Allie Banks ’16 and Lilias Kim ’18—won G.O.L.D. grants, which are designed to inspire students to take initiative with their service work. Allie is working with BiodiversityWorks on Martha’s Vineyard, tracking the declining population of black racer snakes, which prey on mice and therefore may play a role in the spread of Lyme disease. Thousands of miles away, Lilias is teaching English and music to orphans in Vietnam.

In the past, no more than one Groton student had won a Parents’ Independent School Network (PIN) grant per year, but in 2015 four students earned the funding, and received recognition at a spring ceremony. Using PIN grants this summer are Zara Ali ’18, Christine Bernard '17, Yanni Cho '16, and Jay Montima '18. Zara is working with the Akankasha Foundation in India on efforts to keep students in school. Christine is at a summer school in Newark, New Jersey. Jay is working on oral health education in a Mexican village clinic. And Yanni, who has done extensive work with the Special Olympics, is working on a program to inspire the intellectually disabled to find their inner artist.

Groton School is proud to support these exceptional students and looks forward to hearing about their experiences when they are back on campus in the fall.

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