Speaker 1: Omar Hammad (00:09):
The Newcombe Fellowship meant pure joy. It still means pure joy.
Speaker 2: Annie Wilkinson (00:14):
[It] meant time to focus on my dissertation.
Speaker 3: Chloe Bakalar (00:17):
To me it meant hope.
Speaker 4: Nimron Ben Zeev (00:19):
Possibility, the possibility to complete the PhD journey in the best way I could.
Speaker 5: Terrence L. Johnson (00:25):
Receiving the Newcombe Fellowship was a dream come true.
Speaker 2: Annie Wilkinson (00:30):
The Newcombe Fellowship offers not only the financial support that I needed to complete my dissertation, but just as importantly, the motivating recognition that my scholarship mattered.
Speaker 7: Susie Woo (00:41):
It is no understatement to say that it was specifically this fellowship that made me feel like I belonged in academia.
Speaker 5: Terrence L. Johnson (00:50):
This highly prestigious award, which is well regarded within the academy, confirmed to me that the work I wanted to do was important, but also necessary.
Speaker 3: Chloe Bakalar (01:02):
I wasn’t sure that I was going to keep going or was going to be able to keep going, and this gave me that boost, and it gave me the time to keep going and to keep fighting for what I wanted, to keep fighting for the research, and to keep pursuing an academic career path.
Speaker 8: Nyle Fort (01:23):
When I found out that I got it, I was just so happy, so elated, because I knew it was going to help me get through the final year of my program. But I also knew that it was going to help me get through academia even after I left the doctoral program.
Speaker 9: John Christman (01:37):
It was crucial then, as it is now, in keeping academic work focused on values—social, religious, and political values, and keeping the attention of academics on what our work does for society.
Speaker 4: Nimron Ben Zeev (01:54):
Thinking through ethical ideals and religious values means that you answer the question, “so what?” in a way that is easier and more immediate to communicate. It pushes your research outwards rather than further inwards.
Speaker 10: Nancy Sherman (02:08):
My work has always been public-facing and the engagement with citizens has been critical, and I don’t think I would’ve been able to have that kind of focus had I not started early on in my career with the support of the Newcombe.
Speaker 1: Omar Hammad (02:26):
So if we don’t examine and study the effects of religion and how people use religion and express religion, it’s as if we’re ignoring the environment. It’s as if we are ignoring air.
Speaker 11: Susie Steinbach (02:39):
Most of us spend most of our lives figuring out how to live with other people, how to treat other people. So to my mind, the Newcombe mission goes to the heart of all of our lifelong missions.
Speaker 3: Chloe Bakalar (02:53):
Newcombe Fellowship is a way to support and to empower and to enable young scholars who want to delve into these age-old questions of good and bad, right and wrong, and maybe even apply them in contemporary cases, right? See what they mean for us today, given the particular challenges and opportunities of the modern world.
Speaker 7: Susie Woo (03:19):
I cannot express enough just how much this fellowship meant to me and how much it must continue to mean for young scholars who are up and coming right now. And that dissertation, I just published it. Without the help of the Newcombe Fellowship, there is absolutely no way that it would’ve turned into the project that it did. And so I can’t thank you enough. A very happy anniversary to you, and thank you so much for supporting scholars like me and for continuing to support scholars at universities across the United States.