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University of Minnesota Human Rights Center
Human Rights Fellowship Program


                                                                                                                      Complete List of Past Fellows  




2010 Fellows

 

Kadra Abdi

Friends of Ngong Road
Nairobi, Kenya

 

Kadra is pursuing a Masters degree in Public Policy at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs.  She also works as a research assistant in the Center on Women and Public Policy with a focus on black women in leadership positions. 

 

She is using her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to work in Nairobi, Kenya with Friends of Ngong Road, a nonprofit organization that supports children living in the slums of Nairobi who have been affected by HIV/AIDS. Kadra is working as a camp counselor and assisting with organizational development by improving the organization’s library and internet café.

 


Heather Beal
WomanKind Kenya
Garissa, Kenya

Heather Beal is a journalist, author, and photographer with 22 years of experience covering the arts, sustainability, business and cultural trends, and all aspects of the built environment.  Heather earned a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Carleton College, a Masters degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities, and a professional certification in Integrative Creative Studies from the University of St. Thomas.

As an Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellow, Heather will travel to Garissa, Kenya to conduct interviews with the women and girls of WomanKind and use photography to explore universal human rights themes.  She will draw upon the photos and stories generated during these sessions to create a visual journal that will serve as a permanent record of the health and human rights issues confronting women and girls in Northeastern Kenya.

 

Laura Boleen
Western Shoshone Defense Project
Crescent Valley, Nevada

Laura Boleen graduated from Luther College in 2008 with a B.A. in History and Museum Studies. While earning her degree, Laura focused on early U.S. history and the relationship between the U.S. government and American Indians.  She continued pursuing these interests at the University of Minnesota, where she earned her M.A. in Educational Policy and Administration in 2010. At the University of Minnesota, Laura studied international education, development, and indigenous rights.

Laura will spend this summer interning at the Western Shoshone Defense Project (WSDP), which seeks to promote environmental sustainability and cultural practices through community outreach. WSDP looks to restore sovereign land rights to the Western Shoshone tribe through legal support.  Laura is looking forward to working with this grassroots organization and observing how it addresses the challenges of operating in a rural location.

 

Astrid Brouilliard
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)
Arusha, Tanzania

Astrid Brouiliard is a law student at the University of Minnesota going into her second year. She has worked with the Asylum Law Project to assist battered immigrant women and their children. 

Astrid is using her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to provide legal assistance to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, an ad hoc tribunal created by the United Nations Security Council to prosecute perpetrators of the 1994 Rwandan genocide. In this role, she will assist the ICTR with national reconciliation and maintaining peace in the country. 

 

 

 

Jennifer Cornell
Human Rights Center
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota


Jennifer Cornell attended the University of Minnesota and received a B.A. on American Indian Studies and a M.A. in Labor Policy and Public Management.  In 2009, Jennifer worked at Dorsey and Whitney, LLP, preparing memorandums for trial attorneys. She is currently a law student at the University of Minnesota.

 

Jennifer is using her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to create a Human Rights Consortium at the University of Minnesota.  The goal of the Consortium will be to serve as a forum for the varied organizations, professors, and programs concerning human rights at the University of Minnesota to work together on common projects and create a sense of community.

 

 

Colleen Coyne
Human Rights Program
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota

Colleen is a MFA candidate (concentrating in poetry and creative nonfiction) and literature/creative writing instructor at the University of Minnesota; she was also the 2009-2010 Editor-in-Chief of the literary journal Dislocate. She graduated with honors from Johns Hopkins University with a B.A. in Writing Seminars and English and a minor in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies. She went on to receive a M.A. in Humanities from the University of Chicago. Before returning to school at the University of Minnesota, Colleen worked as the Development Associate and Communications & Events Manager at the Hyde Park Art Center, a nonprofit visual art center on Chicago’s south side. In Minneapolis, Colleen works with the Loft Literary Center as an InkTank Teen Council Mentor and teaches poetry workshops to chronic juvenile offenders at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Red Wing (MCF-RW).

As the 2010 Scribe for Human Rights, Colleen will be the writer-in-residence with the Human Rights Program.  In conjunction with her ongoing workshops at MCF-RW, Colleen will design a creative writing initiative with a human rights focus, called “Writing for Rights.â€? This five-session program, which concentrates on the juvenile detention system as a site for education, empowerment, and advocacy, will entail students reading other inmates’ writing and producing their own creative writing about human rights; it will culminate with the production of an anthology to be distributed to local literary venues, education programs at other correctional facilities across the state and the country, and to metro-area high schools. The curriculum that Colleen develops for this project will be available to other students and teachers to use in similar settings or to incorporate into service-learning courses at the University of Minnesota. Colleen will also work with the undergraduate interns of the Human Rights Program (in the College of Liberal Arts) to develop their skills and broaden their perspectives on writing about human rights.

 

 

 

 

Bridgette Da Silva
Human Rights Center
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota

 

Bridgette Da Silva is working toward her Master’s degree in Library and Information Science at St. Catherine University. She earned her B.A. in Political Science from St. Catherine University. 

 

Bridgette is using her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to hone and practice the skills she has developed as a graduate student in Library and Information Sciences to update, reformat, and reorganize the Human Rights Center’s online resources, including the Human Rights Library, the Human Rights and Peace Store, and the Human Rights Education websites.

 

 

 

Anne Fuchs
Helsinki Committee for Human Rights for the Republic of Macedonia
Skopje, Macedonia

Anne just completed her first year at the University of Minnesota Law School.  During the 2010-2011 academic year, she will serve as president for the Amnesty International Student Chapter.  She graduated from St. Thomas University summa cum laude, with a Bachelor of Arts in Justice and Peace Studies and a double minor in Philosophy and History.  Anne has studied in Namibia and South Africa, where she interned with the National Society for Human Rights - Namibia working to identify and rectify human rights violations. In addition, Anne studied conflict resolution in Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom.

As an Upper Midwest Fellow, Anne will be working with the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights for the Republic of Macedonia (MHC) as a legal assistant. MHC provides legal support for human rights issues in the Balkan region and prepares reports on them.

 

 

David Greenwood-Sanchez
Association for Nature and Sustainable Development (ANDES)
Cusco, Peru

David Greenwood-Sanchez grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, and earned his bachelor’s degree from Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, where he studied economics, politics, and violin. He is now working toward a Master’s of Public Policy degree at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, with a concentration in global policy. He is particularly interested in international trade, development, and human rights.

As an Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellow, David will spend the summer working with the Association for Nature and Sustainable Development (ANDES), an indigenous rights organization based in Cusco, Peru. ANDES works primarily with indigenous potato farming communities, helping them to combat the growing threat of biopiracy, the theft of a crop to sell it later on the black market.  David will assist ANDES in maintaining their traditional knowledge systems.  One way in which the organization has done this is through the creation of a Potato Park (el Parque de la Papa), a 22,000 acre bio-cultural heritage area dedicated to the preservation of the Andes landscape and its inhabitants. David will assist in gathering information from indigenous potato farming communities within the park, to be used to evaluate a native potato repatriation project, carried out in partnership with the International Potato Center (www.cipotato.org).

 

Jordan Harlow
Greater Boston Legal Services - Immigration Unit
Boston, Massachusetts

Jordan received his B.A. in Psychology from McGill University in 2008. After spending his last semester in South Africa, he developed a passion for human rights that has followed him to law school.  A member of the Human Rights Trial Advocacy and Litigation Clinic and Vice-President of the International Law Society, Jordan has a strong interest in international public law and human rights. Recently, however, he has become focused on immigration law, which led him to the position he will hold over the summer at Greater Boston Legal Services.

As a member of the Immigration Unit of Greater Boston Legal Services, Jordan will be involved in a number of immigration-related projects and casework. He will be representing clients in immigration court for standard immigration procedures, as well as human rights cases involving asylum, the Convention Against Torture, and the Violence Against Women Act. He will also be conducting research on country standards and for additional projects of the Immigration Unit.

 

Matthew Holm
The Advocates for Human Rights
Minneapolis, Minnesota
 
Matt Holm recently graduated with a Master’s degree from the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. While at the Humphrey Institute, Matt served as a Teaching Assistant for the Global Policy area, where he advised students, coordinated events, and assisted professors.  Prior to attending the Humphrey Institute, he obtained his B.A. in Globalization and Citizenship from the University of Minnesota.  Previously, Matt worked in radio broadcasting and accounting.
 
During the summer of 2010, Matt will serve as a Development Intern with the Advocates for Human Rights, a Minneapolis-based human rights organization.  In this position, Matt will assist with research, tracking, and communications, including donor acquisition and cultivation, grant proposal development and deadline tracking, and creation of publications and marketing materials.

 

 

Angelina Jones
Women in Progress (WIP)
Cape Coast, Ghana

Angelina R. Jones grew up in Tucson, Arizona and studied Clothing Design and Art History at the University of Arizona as an undergraduate. She is currently pursuing a Master’s in Design, Housing, and Apparel with an emphasis in Retail Merchandising and a minor in Human Rights at the University of Minnesota.  Angelina’s research interests include labor and employment standards in apparel production, the corporate social responsibility practices of retailers, and fair trade/alternative trade apparel. She is currently writing her thesis on fair trade apparel wholesalers and retailers based in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota.

This summer, Angelina will be in Cape Coast, Ghana, where she will be interning with the non-profit organization Women in Progress (WIP). The mission of WIP is to empower women in Ghana to be economically independent. The organization achieves this by sourcing clothing and accessories manufactured by women-owned businesses in Ghana, and selling these goods wholesale in the United States through their “Global Mamas� name brand. As an intern, Angelina will develop and lead fair trade education workshops for business owners that produce merchandise for WIP. These workshops will introduce business owners to fair trade labor practices and standards, as well as give Angelina practical experience with the implementation of fair trade standards in apparel production.

 

Elizabeth Kerre
Indigenous Fisher People’s Network (IFP)
Kisumu, Kenya

Elizabeth Kerre graduated from University of Minnesota in 2010 with a B.A. in Political Science and Global Studies. While attending the University of Minnesota, she focused on governance, peace, and justice in Africa. In 2008-2009, Elizabeth worked with the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights in Nairobi, where she monitored the resettlement, reintegration, and return of Internally Displaced Persons, as well as carried out legal research. Elizabeth also worked for World Relief of Minnesota as a Refugee Employment Counselor and actively participated in the resettlement process of refugees, asylees, and immigrants in Minnesota.

This summer, Elizabeth will work with the Indigenous Fisher People’s Network (IFP). The IFP works to end the discrimination faced by minority and indigenous peoples in Kenya.  She will work on improving the governance of these groups and empowering citizens so that minority and indigenous group’s rights will be secure in ongoing political reforms in Kenya.

 



Willy Madeira
American Refugee Committee
Minneapolis, Minnesota
 
Willy Madeira is a second year student at the University of Minnesota Law School. In the past, Willy has worked as a legal intern with Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center and the ACLU in Pennsylvania. Willy also served in the PeaceCorps in Zambia as a community health organizer, working on prevention and community health.
 
As an Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellow, Willy is working with the American Refugee Committee to develop its legal aid program for countries in which it operates. Willy will also assist with ARC’s other programs, such as micro-enterprise and small business assistance.

 

Brett Mares
Center on Wrongful Convictions,
Northwestern University Law School
Chicago, Illinois

Brett Mares is a second year law student at the University of Minnesota. He graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with a B.A. in History with a concentration in Minority Studies. Brett is also a founder of Disaster Relief Volunteer Services, a non-profit organization that funds and plans volunteer service trips to areas affected by natural disasters.

This summer, Brett will be working at Northwestern University Law School's Center on Wrongful Convictions where he will be assisting the Center with their research on the wrongfully convicted, both in a historical and modern legal context. Brett will also work with individuals who are currently seeking the assistance of the Center.

 

Korla Masters
Centro Arte para la Paz
Suchitoto, El Salvador

Korla Masters recently graduated from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, where she received a B.A. in Religious Studies with a focus in social justice across traditions.   While earning her B.A., Korla worked in the University’s Human Rights Center, first as an intern and later as the coordinator of the Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship Program. 

Korla will spend a year at Centro Arte para la Paz in Suchitoto, El Salvador, a community center involved in providing alternative education opportunities across generations, through English, technology, and art classes, photography and theater programs, and a community library.  Korla will facilitate and participate in a patchwork of these programs, as well as other aspects of the daily maintenance of the Center. 

 

Tatewin Means
Tribal Law and Policy Institute
West Hollywood, California

Tatewin Means received her B.S. in Environmental Engineering in 2002 from Stanford University. She spent the subsequent years working at the University of Minnesota Law School’s Indian Child Welfare Act Clinic and the Law Offices of Leventhal & Associates.  Tatewin is currently attending the University of Minnesota Law School and expects to graduate in 2010.

During her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship, Tatewin will work with the Tribal Law and Policy Institute on projects concerning violence against women and assist in the development of tribal codes and programs addressing domestic violence and stalking.

 

Timothy Meyer
Helsinki Citizens Assembly,
Refugee and Advocacy Support Program

Istanbul, Turkey

Timothy Meyer is currently a second year law student at the University of Minnesota. Tim has focused on public interest and international issues during his time in law school.  He worked for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in 2009.

For his Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship, Tim intends to work as a legal fellow at the Helsinki Citizens Assembly—Refugee Advocacy and Support Program. He is using this opportunity to assist refugees in Turkey to apply for refugee status so that they may gain the corresponding protections and benefits that derive from this classification. Tim is also working with other non-governmental organizations as they undertake to improve and strengthen the activities of Turkey’s civil society.

 

 

Jonathan Moler
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)
Arusha, Tanzania

Jonathan Moler is a second year law student at the University of Minnesota Law School. Jonathan has previously worked as a Peace Corp Volunteer in Uganda. It was through his experiences in the Peace Corps and the people he met during his time in Uganda that interested him in the African Great Lakes region.

Jonathan Moler is using his Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to work for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, where he will hold a positing as a Chambers Legal Officer. As such, Jonathan’s duties will be to produce witness summaries, draft judgments, and assist in the tribunal’s goal to bring those that committed the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 to justice.

 

Neil Panchmatia
Hands Across the World
St. Cloud, Minnesota

Neil Panchmatia is a native-born Kenyan attending St. Cloud State University on a student visa. He has also worked at the Center for International Studies as a graduate assistant.

During his Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship, Neil is working with Hands Across the World to provide learning opportunities to refugees and immigrants in Minnesota.

 

 

Kristin Paulson
Kalika Community Hospital and GREMALTES Hospital
Rasuwa, Nepal and Chennai, India

Kristin Paulson is currently attending the University of Minnesota School of Medicine earning a JD/MPH Joint Degree with the School of Public Health.  At the School of Medicine, Kristin works with Dr. Valapour doing research on policy and ethics.

Kristin will use her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to work at three different nonprofit hospitals in Nepal and India, all funded and operated by foreign organizations. Kristin will shadow physicians and evaluate the services provided in order to determine what roles the hospitals play in the communities that they serve. From these experiences, Kristin will attempt to discover what level of investment will be required from the home state to replace them with domestic funding and support.

 

Kristen Rau
Center for Justice and Accountability
San Francisco, California 

Kristen Rau is currently pursuing both a Juris Doctor (JD) and a Master of Public Policy (MPP) degree at the University of Minnesota, as well as a graduate minor in Human Rights. Kristen grew up in Minot, North Dakota, and graduated from Minot High School in 2003. She studied English and French at St. Olaf College in Minnesota as a National Merit Scholar, after which she graduated magna cum laude in 2007. She was a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar in Tanzania and Uganda from September 2008 to May 2009. She has held internships with the U.S. Senate (Washington, D.C.), the U.S. State Department (Prague, Czech Republic), the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (Minneapolis, Minnesota), and the Refugee Law Project (Kampala, Uganda).

This summer, Kristen will be interning in San Francisco, California with the Center for Justice and Accountability, an international human rights organization dedicated to deterring human rights abuses and bringing the perpetrators of such abuses to justice.

 

Matthew Roberts
Environmental Defender’s Office of New South Wales
Lismore, Australia

Matthew Roberts is a University of Minnesota Law Student who will be graduating in May 2011.  He has served on the International Moot Court, the Asylum Law Project, and the annual law student musical performance (T.O.R.T.).  He was a judicial extern in summer 2009 with Minnesota’s 2nd District Court.

For his Fellowship, Matthew will travel to Lismore, Australia, where he will work with the Environmental Defender’s Office there.  He will work on casework and advocacy on major environmental issues. Owing to its unique ecosystem and history, Australia has become a major world leader in species conservation and carbon emissions standards.  He hopes to bring the lessons he learns in Australia back to the U.S., where he hopes to become an influential voice in the U.S. environmental law community.

 

Jordan Shepherd
ACLU Foundation of Southern California
Los Angeles, California

Jordan Shepherd is a student at the University of Minnesota Law School, specializing in International Human Rights Law.  Jordan completed a Master of Arts degree in Anthropology focusing on refugee studies at Texas Tech University. Jordan’s research and activism on refugee issues has taken him around the world to such diverse places as El Paso, Texas, Istanbul, Turkey, Seoul, South Korea, and Minneapolis, Minnesota.  Jordan’s experiences have spurred him to study international issues relating to conflicts and migration.  

This summer, Jordan will be working for the ACLU Foundation of Southern California as an Upper Midwest Fellow. He will work with Paul Hoffman, a leading human rights litigator, on a project that focuses on international human rights cases.  Jordan will also conduct research and draft assignments on procedural and substantive law in U.S. trial and appellate courts, as well as international human rights standards. This work will focus on the relationship between the U.S. judicial process and international legal norms.

 

 

Jennifer Simmelink
Center for Victims of Torture
Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo

Jennifer Simmelink, MSW, is a Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota School of Social Work.  She has a background in mental health treatment and research with refugees and survivors of war trauma and torture.  She has also worked extensively in drug and alcohol treatment with adults. 

For her Fellowship, Jennifer will be working with Center for Victims of Torture in the Democratic Republic of Congo.  CVT provides psychosocial education and counseling services to survivors of torture and war trauma in three locations in Southeastern Congo.  Jennifer will work with research staff at all three locations to provide program evaluation support.

 

 

Adepeju Solarin
Association for the Defense of the Azerbaijani Political Prisoner in Iran (ADAPP)
Vancouver, British Columbia

Before being an Upper Midwest Fellow, Adepeju Solarin previously worked as a Human Rights Minor Cohort Coordinator at the Human Rights Program at the University of Minnesota.  Adepeju also worked at the University of Minnesota Law School as an Associate Editor at the Institute on Crime and Public Policy.

Adepeju will use her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to work at the Association for the Defense of the Azerbaijani Political Prisoner in Iran (ADAPP). This position will give her the opportunity to work to protect the interest and rights of people from Iran all over the world. Adepeju will do undertake a range of tasks, including writing press releases and doing research about first amendment rights.

 

Elizabeth Super
Transitional Justice Institute (TJI)
Belfast, Northern Ireland

Elizabeth Super grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, and is currently a second-year law student at the University of Minnesota.  Her interest in human rights and passion for social justice was transformed last summer while working at the Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she studied conflict resolution.

This summer, her Fellowship will assist her in continuing her work at TJI on the Inquiries Observation Project. Elizabeth will assist in researching and writing the final report evaluating the inquiries into allegations of collusion by the British Government in the deaths of three individuals in Northern Ireland during the period of conflict known as the Troubles. Elizabeth is honored to receive this Fellowship and is grateful for the opportunity to return to Northern Ireland.

 

 

Catheranne Wyly
ACLU of Minnesota
St. Paul, Minnesota

Catheranne Wyly is student at the University of Minnesota Law School. She earned her BA in Political Science and Sociology at Beloit College. Catheranne also worked for the Central Alabama Fair Housing Center assisting in client intake and community outreach.

 

Catheranne will use her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship to help the ACLU’s efforts to assess human rights abuses in detention facilities across Minnesota. Specifically, Catheranne will assist the ACLU by conducting legal research and writing letters to address issues of immediate need to local jails in Minnesota.

 

Laura Wilson
JUST Equity
St. Paul, Minnesota

Laura Wilson is a student at the University of Minnesota Law School.  Her previous experience with human rights comes from her time working at the Waite House Neighborhood Center on the Mujeres en Liderazgo project. While there, she worked with a Latina women’s leadership group and assisted in the development of a legislative campaign to increase immigrants’ access to driver’s licenses.

Using her Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship, Wilson will work with an organization named JUST Equity. JUST Equity works with the members of the Rondo neighborhood to push for mitigation of the anticipated social, cultural, and economic impacts caused by the construction of the Central Corridor Light Rail line.

 

 

Maiyia Yang
International Organization for Migration
Mae Sariang, Thailand

Maiyia Yang is a third year doctoral student in Comparative and International Development Education with a minor in human rights.  She received her M.A. from the University of San Diego in Peace and Justice. During her studies, she visited Lugufu Refugee Camp in western Tanzania to learn about peace education.  Maiyia completed her undergraduate work at the University of Minnesota in Global Studies, Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature, and Linguistics.  With experience interpreting for asylum interviews, Maiyia is deeply interested in the refugee and immigrant experience.  Although too young to remember it, Maiyia was born in a refugee camp and resettled shortly thereafter.  Nevertheless, her family’s experience has shaped her professional and academic interests.  As a result, Maiyia is eager to learn about the life histories of Karen women, one of the Minnesota’s newer and lesser-known refugee and immigrant communities. 

During her fellowship, Maiyia will work with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Mae Sariang, Thailand, where she will assist with resettlement projects for Karen refugees.  She will work on completing the necessary documentation prior to departure, arranging and assisting with transportation, and distributing supplies as needed.  This experience will provide Maiyia with the opportunity to learn about the processes and procedures that are part of resettlement, as well as the experience of resettling.  Most importantly, Maiyia hopes that the experience gained will shed light on some of the educational and human rights issues faced by many of Minnesota’s refugees and immigrants. 

 

 

 

 


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