MIDDLEBURY, Vt.—A 2006 Middlebury College graduate is conducting research on Pemba Island off the coast of East Africa prior to enrolling at the University of Cambridge in England this September as a Gates Cambridge Scholar.
Stella Nordhagen, from Snowmass Village, Colo., has been working in Africa as a post-baccalaureate fellow in quantitative global health research, first with the Harvard Institute for Global Health and later with the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluations based at the University of Washington.
Now, as the second Middlebury graduate to receive a Gates Cambridge Scholarship—the first was Leda Smith '02 in 2005—Nordhagen is preparing for a year of intensive study at Cambridge in pursuit of a master’s degree (M. Phil.) in economics.
Gates Cambridge Scholarships are full-cost awards for graduate study and research for students who demonstrate a commitment to improving the lives of others. Created in 2000 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Gates Cambridge Scholarship Program this year attracted 635 applications from U.S. citizens and only 45 were selected.
Nordhagen majored in economics at Middlebury and graduated summa cum laude. One of her professors, Peter Hans Matthews, recalls that “Stella demonstrated as much academic promise as any student I have taught at Middlebury over the last decade or so.”
Through her work as a research assistant with Matthews and economics faculty Jeff Carpenter and Jessica Holmes, her research on inequality and poverty, her deep interest in environmental economics, and her enthusiasm for physics and astronomy, it came as no surprise to Matthews that Nordhagen had earned a Gates Cambridge Scholarship.
“Any top-10 graduate program would be fortunate to count Stella among their number,” he said.
At Middlebury, Stella Carol Julie Nordhagen also left her mark as a captain of the Debate Society, treasurer of the College Democrats, organizer of the Millenium Goals Awareness Month, board member of the International Students Organization, and tutor in physics and economics.