Smitha Ganeshan – 2013 Truman Scholar Smitha Ganeshan, FF ’14, an anthropology major with pre-med intentions, received a 2013 Harry S. Truman Scholarship, which recognizes juniors with exceptional leadership potential who are committed to careers in government and elsewhere in public service. She is the 18th UGA recipient of the scholarship since 1982, the first year UGA students won the award. Smitha, who aims to pursue dual MD and Master of Public Policy degrees, is active in healthcare and health policy issues in Athens and across the globe. She has been involved with UGA’s Roosevelt Institute, a student-run think tank, since her freshman year and currently directs its health policy center and its environmental policy center. Through the Roosevelt Institute, she developed a policy proposal to improve access to primary care services for low-income and uninsured patients.
Sara Black – 2013 Udall Scholar Two University of Georgia Honors students were among 50 students nationwide who were awarded 2013 Morris K. Udall and Stewart L. Udall Foundation Scholarships. The scholarships are awarded annually to outstanding sophomores and juniors pursuing careers focused on environmental or Native American public policy. The recipients bring the university’s total of Udall Scholars to 12 in the past 10 years. This year’s recipients are Sara Black, FF ’14, who is pursuing degrees in anthropology and ecology, and Ian Karra, a junior Honors student who is pursuing degrees in economics and finance. Matt Tyler, FF ’14, who is pursuing a dual bachelor’s/master’s degree in political science from the School of Public and International Affairs, received an honorable mention. Sara plans to pursue a career in the environmental or food justice non-profit sector. She has held national
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Smitha volunteers at the non-profit Athens Nurses Clinic, which provides basic primary care and dental services for uninsured patients, and has interned at the Athens Health Network, an organization that works to reduce healthcare disparities by coordinating health services for the indigent population. She is a member of the Lunchbox Garden Project, an after-school nutrition education and obesity prevention program that now serves two schools in Athens through a grant from UGA’s Office of Sustainability. As an intern at the Greater New York Hospital Association, Smitha worked under Executive Vice President and General Counsel Susan C. Waltman, a trustee of the UGA Foundation and an alumna, to translate evidencebased obesity prevention models into programs for hospital implementation. She has studied at Oxford University and interned at the World Health Organization’s M.V. Hospital for Diabetes in Chennai, India, where she worked as a member of the epidemiology team. The following winter, she worked at a mobile health clinic in Lima, Peru and later that year assisted a physician at a community health clinic in Nicaragua.
leadership positions in prominent grassroots organizations, including the Real Food Challenge, the Greenhorns, the Sierra Club and the Sierra Student Coalition, where she currently works to coordinate trainings on grassroots organizing skills for young people. She is also a co-founder of Real Food UGA, a campus organization working with Food Services on sustainability initiatives. She has participated in the UGA Washington Semester program and studied abroad at Oxford University. Ian and Sara colead Georgia YES (Youth for Environmental Solutions), a network of more than 75 student environmental leaders on more than a dozen campuses in Georgia. The organization works to promote clean energy infrastructure and policy on college campuses throughout the state.
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Annual Report