Tufts 1+4 Fellows

Hometown: Lalitpur, Nepal
High School: Budhanilkantha School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Education and Training

Rujen was born in Nepal. As he grew up, he was very active in the community and believed in giving back. He worked as the Academic Captain in his school, tutoring young students. He also tutored high school students during his break after high school. He admires education and is looking forward to spending quality time with children over the next year. He expects that the bridge year will be an opportunity to serve and self-explore. He also plays the guitar, is an enthusiastic footballer, and loves taking photos.

Hometown: Saint Paul, MN
High School: Central High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Social Impact

Henry grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he attended a Spanish immersion grade school. He gained a love for Latin American and Spanish culture when his family hosted several foreign interns who each worked at the school for a year. In high school, Henry completed the IB diploma program and organized a National Honors Society fundraiser for the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. In his free time he loves playing soccer and has worked as both a referee and a coach. Over his bridge year he especially looks forward to becoming fluent in Spanish and experiencing the other side of a family stay.

Hometown: Idyllwild, CA
High School: Idyllwild Arts Academy
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Arts & Cultural Preservation

After living in a mountain town of 3,000 people for her entire life, Audrey is excited to see the world! She is an artist and an activist, having spent the last five years learning metalworking, mural painting, and printmaking. She is a proponent of art as a tool for communication, and has used that idea to work with biologists and engineers to create public art pieces that educate about climate change. She loves surfing, hiking, and reading, and is hoping to continue learning about the relationship between art and social issues in her time in Ecuador—as well as finally learning Spanish!

Hometown: Bellingham, WA
High School: Sehome High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Arts & Cultural Preservation

Jennifer Frye attended Sehome High School in Bellingham, Washington. She explored many areas of interest, from becoming a Science Olympiad team leader and competing on the math team to playing in North Sound Youth Symphony and tutoring at the student learning center. Jennifer’s main passions are languages (French and Spanish) and the arts, specifically cello and ceramics. Her arts and culture service placement in Cuenca, Ecuador will allow Jennifer to share her artistic abilities while learning from a foreign culture. The global perspective gained from her bridge year will enrich Jennifer’s International Relations major at Tufts University. Eventually, Jennifer hopes to have a career in diplomacy.

Hometown: Claremont, CA
High School: The Webb Schools
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Wildlife Preservation & Environmental Sustainability

After spending his early years in the United States, Jonas was able to live in London, England, for five years, where he developed an affinity for traveling and laid the foundations for becoming a strong global citizen. Being in England also enabled him to experience and appreciate different cultures and the way they interact in a global hub. Residing in California for the past three years, Jonas developed a love for the environment and the ocean. He hopes to continue his experience utilizing different leadership models and developing new ways of communicating with people during his bridge year in Brazil. Jonas is excited not only to learn Portuguese, but to hear the stories and experiences of the people he meets while in Brazil. Jonas’ passion for soccer will also enable him to immerse himself in the Brazilian culture through a very intimate context. When he returns to Tufts, he plans on majoring in International Relations or exploring something in the field of environmental science.

Hometown: Wyckoff, NJ
High School: Montclair Kimberley Academy
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Service Area: Social Impact

Max Goldfarb is passionate about Spanish, travel, community service, and sports. During high school, Max participated in an educational exchange program between his school and the Instituto Abdón Cifuentes in Santiago, Chile, in which he hosted two Chilean students for one month each and traveled to Chile in the summer following his sophomore year. Max has traveled extensively, including visits to France, Spain, Russia, Israel, and Italy, and has greatly enjoyed learning about different cultures. He is deeply committed to community service, serving as a junior coach during high school for the New Jersey Dare Devils special ice hockey club and working as a counselor at Ramapo for Children, a summer camp for children with autism, learning disabilities, and special needs. Additionally, Max spent a week in Guatemala building a house for a rural family and started a high school club that helps send supplies to people in need in Central American nations. Finally, Max participated in varsity ice hockey, track and field, and tennis in high school, and enjoys following his favorite college and pro teams. As a result of attending the Wharton Sports Business Academy last summer, Max has developed a deep interest in business and hopes to apply the fundamental skills he learned at Wharton during his social entrepreneurship placement in Cuenca. At Tufts, he is interested in studying either International Business or International Relations, in addition to continuing his Spanish studies.

Hometown: Gainesville, TX
High School: Gainesville High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Wildlife Preservation & Environmental Sustainability

Trevor has a passion for learning new things and cultivating new passions. Although he has not had much opportunity to travel, he was thrilled to discover Tufts 1+4 and leapt at the opportunity to participate. He tends to venture out of his comfort zone, sparking his passion for mathematics, tennis, theater, hammocking, and medicine. Trevor wishes to not only pick up a new language and learn about a new culture in Brazil, but also to have an enriching experience through which he will learn lessons that he believes a college education cannot teach him. After Brazil, Trevor intends to attend medical school after completing his undergraduate education at Tufts. After that, he aspires to help revolutionize global health and to improve health equity across the world. 

Hometown: Waterford, CT
High School: Waterford High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: León, Nicaragua
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Youth Development & Education

Sophie grew up in Waterford, Connecticut, and is excited to experience an entirely new culture in Nicaragua. In high school, Sophie was an active participant in tennis, dance, and violin. Additionally, her experiences in her school’s Model United Nations club led her to develop a passion for global issues and awareness. Sophie spent her summers working as a junior counselor at her 4H camp. She is passionate about women’s rights and is looking forward to working in this area. At Tufts, Sophie plans to study biomedical engineering and dreams of becoming an engineer working in the developing world.

Hometown: Wilton, CT
High School: Wilton High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Social Impact

Elizabeth is from Wilton, Connecticut, and has lived there her entire life, so she is very excited to be spending her bridge year in Ecuador. She is an avid musician and will be bringing her violin with her, hoping to play in a local orchestra and share her passion with others. As well as playing music, Elizabeth loves working with other people and is looking forward to spending time with Ecuadorian youth through her placement. Furthermore, she loves staying active, and is excited to explore the gyms and running routes around Cuenca. Due to a newfound passion from a NOLS backpacking expedition, she is also open to any hiking opportunities that may arise in order to experience all aspects of Ecuador. Overall, she is looking forward to refining her Spanish and learning about Ecuadorian culture, as well as making lifelong friends. When she arrives at Tufts, she plans on studying cognitive science and possibly English, and she hopes that her time in Ecuador will allow her to explore new ideas and expand her interests.

Hometown: Washington, D.C.
High School: Woodrow Wilson Senior High
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Wildlife Preservation & Environmental Sustainability

Dominique was raised in Washington, D.C., by a Mexican mother and a Colombian father. She took advantage of her mixed heritage to get a unique perspective on race and diversity. In high school, she became an active member of a recently founded group called Common Ground, which opened a safe space for discussing important social issues like segregation, criminal justice, fair policing, and inequity. In addition, she took several leadership roles, including the coordination of the biomedical track and the presidency of the Science Math and Technology Academy where she studied. Her volunteer work at the National Veterans Affairs Medical Center has influenced her to listen and help others. She plans to major in Community Health on a pre-med track at Tufts and to gracefully tie together her interest in medicine with her artistic skills. Dominique is incredibly excited to gain a new worldly perspective in Santa Catarina, and to be able to make a positive impact on the community there.

Hometown: Minneapolis, MN
High School: Southwest High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: León, Nicaragua
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Environmental Sustainability, Conservation & Renewable Energy Technologies

John always wants to try new things. When he learned about the Tufts 1+4 program, it seemed like a great way to experience something brand new, and do worthwhile work at the same time. Growing up in a household that reused everything until it was in tatters, filled backyard barrels with kitchen scraps for composting, and installed solar panels on the roof, taught John to be environmentally conscious from a young age. Being able to work on renewable energy and sustainable communities will combine his passion for environmental work and scientific study. John hopes to bring his new knowledge back from his bridge year and apply it to make his education more valuable. Above all, he wants to explore what the world has to offer, and hopefully learn a thing or two about Nicaraguan culture.

Hometown: Newton, MA
High School: Newton South High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Washington D.C.
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Educational Equity

Timmy grew up just outside of Boston, only 40 minutes away from Tufts’ Medford campus. He is passionate about politics, volunteering for presidential campaigns since 2008. The thing that Timmy has always been most passionate about is inequality. He has always yearned to close inequality gaps, which led him to apply to City Year. With two parents who sought graduate education, Timmy has always understood the importance of education to everything in a person’s life, from their career to their character. City Year provides a unique opportunity for Timmy to give back through education, something which has shaped his life deeply. Timmy will be serving at Kimball Elementary in Washington, D.C.’s inner city and hopes to make a positive impact on the lives of others.

Hometown: Cambridge, MA
High School: Cambridge Rindge and Latin School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Wildlife Preservation & Environmental Sustainability

Nicolás is passionate about helping the environment, watching and playing soccer, and being Latino. He is involved in club and high school soccer, and is an avid member of the marine conservation club. He also enjoys spending time with his friends and listening to rap music. His favorite quote is by Charles Bukowski: "find what you love and let it kill you."

Hometown: St. Cloud, MN
High School: Apollo High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: León, Nicaragua
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Youth Development & Education

Ever since traveling to Spain, Italy, and France with her Spanish class last year, Linnea has been excited to perfect her Spanish and see new corners of the world through international travel. She has spent her last few summers volunteering her time to teach immigrant children English and has worked in preschools, so she looks forward to using her passion for working with children during her bridge year. Although she will miss participating in theater for the next year, she hopes to use her drama and music skills to engage the children she will be working with in the coming year. Once she returns to Tufts, she plans to pursue a degree in psychology for the pre-law track. Eventually she hopes to find a career that merges psychology, law, and children's rights. 

Hometown: Magna, UT
High School: Cyprus High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: León, Nicaragua
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Youth Development & Education

Nadia is Mexican-American, raised all over Utah with some elementary years spent in Mexico. Throughout their high-school career, after finding a passion for politics and for helping the disenfranchised, they became a part of several political collectives such as League of United Latin American Citizens, Latinos in Action, and co-founded their school's Gender-Sexuality Alliance. To give back to their community, they joined a Youth Court organization to help break the school-to-prison pipeline in their area. One summer, they even got the chance to help organize a march to their state capitol against an unfair, anti-undocumented-immigrant scholarship funded by the government. For the most part, they spend their time attending community events (and volunteering in them!) to learn more about themselves, their culture, and the cultures of other people. They like to spend their time with community elders to learn how to best use their skills to pay it forward, so to speak. Once in a while, they take some time to write, creatively or otherwise, and they've won a few local awards for it. They hope to give young girls the same space, confidence, and skills to make of themselves what they please, just as they have. With a focus on politics, multicultural experiences and a look into lives other than their own should help to broaden and deepen the knowledge they will gain at Tufts. They also have been dreaming of travel and of new perspectives!

Hometown: Taft, TN
High School: Lincoln County High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Social Impact

Leonardo Ruiz Sánchez was born in Mexico and moved to the U.S. when he was five years old. He is passionate about social justice, civil rights, and Mexican candy. Growing up in rural Tennessee, Leonardo saw an abundance of social inequality and racism, which inspired him to strive for a brighter future. He is involved in his school and community by volunteering at his local library, pet shelter, and an after-school program. He hopes to continue his passion for social progress during his bridge year in Brazil. He wishes to gain a clearer understanding of world issues and of himself while also learning another language and experiencing a whole new culture. When he returns to Tufts, he believes that he will have a better sense of his passions and what he wants to commit to studying.

Hometown: San Jose, CA
High School: Menlo School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Education & Training

Savion was born and raised in the Bay Area and has lived in California all his life. He’s excited to finally get to explore the world around him and can’t wait for all the new opportunities and work experience the bridge year will provide him. During his summers, he enjoys working at children’s summer camps and volunteering at organizations dedicated to improving the lives of underprivileged families. In his free time, he enjoys playing the piano and the clarinet in his school orchestra, and learning languages whenever he can. In high school, he was also involved in a small rock band and played in multiple locations around the Bay Area. He hopes to carry his volunteer experience with him to Brazil, where he’ll be focused on childhood education. When he returns to Tufts next fall, he will most likely study Computer Science.

Hometown: Durham , NC
High School: Riverside High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Arts & Cultural Preservation

Kelsey lives in Durham, North Carolina, and is very engaged with the art community there. She loves all forms of art and sees it as a way to participate in global dialogue. In high school she took classes in visual art, film photography, videography, screen printing, and pottery. She also participated in Nasher Teens Council in collaboration with the Nasher Museum at Duke University, and in Governor's School—a summer program of exceptional high school students. Her artwork has been shown in numerous shows and galleries including NC Central University, The Carrack Gallery, and Meredith College. In her art practice she is always eager to explore new mediums. Kelsey loves travel and exploring in her life as much as in her art. During her bridge year she hopes to expand her outlook both in art and life. At Tufts she will be part of the dual degree program with SMFA, and wants to pursue a degree in Film and Visual Art.

Hometown: Durham , NC
High School: Riverside High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: León, Nicaragua
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Environmental Sustainability, Conservation & Renewable Energy Technologies

Brenna grew up in Durham, North Carolina, and loves spending time exploring the city and taking photographs. She has done photography throughout high school and has had work displayed in the North Carolina State Fair and the Hugh Mangum Photography Museum. Street photography has sparked an interest for her to document life as art and to understand global cultures. She also devotes her time to numerous social causes, including English as a Second Language tutoring, participating in her school’s Gay Straight Alliance, and social justice campaigns in the Durham Community. In high school, taking classes in AP Human Geography and AP Environmental Science contributed to her passion for environmental equity and working for a sustainable future. At Tufts she plans to study Environmental Studies and Peace and Justice.

Hometown: Los Angeles, CA
High School: Camino Nuevo High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Environmental Sustainability & Biodiversity

Chastidy is from Los Angeles. Her dad is from Ecuador and immigrated to the United States in his 20s, where he met her mother who was born in Laos. Growing up she’s heard a lot about Ecuador, so she looks forward to learning more about her own cultural heritage. Her hobbies include drawing, reading, and trying new food. She’s incredibly grateful to have grown up in Los Angeles where there is such a diverse range of food and culture!  In Ecuador, she will be doing work focused on waste management, green energy, and sustainability. In high school she participated in various engineering enrichment programs, and is eager to learn more about sustainable energy in the city as she plans on majoring in Civil Engineering at Tufts. 

Hometown: Hamilton, NY
High School: Hamilton Central School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Santa Catarina, Brazil
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Wildlife Preservation & Environmental Sustainability

Sophie has grown up in Germany and the small town of Hamilton, NY. She is passionate about multicultural understanding and taking care of the world and each other. In high school, she was part of her school’s Amnesty International, Model UN, and language clubs, among others. Theater has also been a huge part of her high school career, from being in productions to directing a middle school musical, and she hopes to continue to engage with the arts. She looks forward to learning Portuguese, immersing herself in a new culture, and meeting new people while exploring the field of environmental sustainability. She is excited to discover more about herself and the world during her stay in Brazil, and will continue to find ways to follow her passions at Tufts.

Hometown: Demarest, NJ
High School: Phillips Academy
Tufts 1+4 Location: New York, NY
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Educational Equity

Katherine comes from communities where high school graduation is not only an expectation, but nearly a given. Growing up in the suburbs of Northern New Jersey, Katherine has known nothing else but academic and social support systems which have been designed for her success. With these systems in place, dropping out of school for her seems unthinkable. She hopes that her year doing City Year in New York will complicate her understanding of many students' realities, which do not share the same kinds of stability and support that Katherine has been privileged to have. During the past three years at boarding school, Katherine participated in a community engagement program at an elementary school in Lawrence, MA. While the flaws of the American education system were obvious and paradoxically necessary—standardized test-centered curricula, for example—Katherine was more interested in engaging with the students to cultivate their self-respect and self-confidence. She hopes to make any amount of a positive difference in the way students consider and carry themselves in and out of the classroom. Besides being excited and grateful for this upcoming opportunity, Katherine loves performing spoken word poetry, learning about behavioral science, eating, and practicing yoga.

Hometown: Austin, TX
High School: Westwood High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Social Impact

Stephanie has always enjoyed working with people and mentoring younger kids. Since 7th grade she has been an active member of an all-girls robotics team in Austin, Texas. As a leader on this team for four years she was often teaching and collaborating with young adults and mentors to produce the most competitive robot possible. She is very excited to bring the skills she has learned from robotics to her service placement in Ecuador. Stephanie was also an active participant in Girl Scouts for 13 years, earning her Gold Award. In high school she completed the International Baccalaureate program and was an active member in National Honor Society and National French Honor Society. Stephanie’s love of adventure was developed during an exchange program in France (10th grade) and an Outward Bound excursion (11th grade). During her time in Ecuador, Stephanie hopes to make a true impact in the lives of the people she works with, while also developing a new perspective on life and how to influence the world around her.

Hometown: Fort Bragg, CA
High School: Fort Bragg High School
Tufts 1+4 Location: Cuenca, Ecuador
Tufts 1+4 Service Area: Environmental Sustainability & Biodiversity

Max has always enjoyed putting himself in new and uncomfortable situations, so when he heard about the 1+4 program he decided that was something he wanted to do. He is passionate about the environment, and is excited to help out with and learn as much as he can from his service placement. He has always loved exploring, in nature or in the heart of a bustling city, so he is very excited to live in the city of Cuenca while surrounded by the Andes Mountains. In high school, he participated in just about every activity that seemed interesting; from being president of the Interact Club to a lawyer on the Mock Trial team. His experience with the Interact club taught him to love community service and realize the huge effect people can have on each other with a little bit of work. In his free time, Max enjoys reading, writing, running ultramarathons, and playing music. He hopes to continue his passions on his bridge year, as well as discover new ones. He loves meeting new people, and is thrilled to immerse himself in a culture and environment drastically different than what he is used to.