5 juniors win SINSI fellowship

Five juniors have been awarded fellowships for the Wilson School’s Scholars in the Nation’s Service Initiative, a program to promote and sponsor students’ work in the federal government.

Nathan Eckstein ’16, Jamal Johnson ’16, Abyssinia Lissanu ’16, Michelle Nedashkovskaya ’16 and Alex Wheatley ’16 will spend the summer after their junior year working in federal agencies. After graduating, they will spend a summer studying a foreign language and then enter the Wilson School’s two-year MPA program. The SINSI fellowship, which allows scholars to gain experience in service and in scholarship, is placed between the two years.

Eckstein, a Wilson School concentrator, had known about SINSI since his freshman year, and was excited about the opportunities in public service it would offer him. He said he had aspired toward a career in foreign service since high school.

“What’s amazing is that I can experience the career of a foreign service officer, and test my commitment to it, without ‘contracting in’ so to speak,” he said. “That’s part of what makes SINSI unique.”

He decided to apply halfway through his sophomore year just as he was accepting an internship to work at the U.S. Embassy in La Paz, Bolivia. He said that at the time, he told himself that if he enjoyed working in Bolivia, he would definitely apply for the fellowship.

Politics concentrator Lissanu said she first heard about the fellowship from fellow scholars in Princeton Faith and Action during the spring of her freshman year. She added that she was hesitant on whether to apply, but speaking to a fellow PFA member and SINSI scholar solidified her desire to apply.

Johnson, a politics major, said he found the program to suit his interests in policy and in urban studies.

“When I first heard about it, a while back, I had a friend who was also a SINSI scholar, and I could tell that it was an interesting opportunity to get engaged, because you’re working in the federal government,” he said.

Nedashkovskaya, a politics major, remarked that SINSI was a perfect fit for her interests in international relations and foreign affairs, which started when she was 13.

“SINSI is first and foremost a program about service. It’s not even about getting a job; you’re supposed to demonstrate a proclivity for service not only in your career aspirations, but on a personal level,” she said.

Nedashkovskaya added that she felt that the program values personal background and interests over an applicant’s résumé and a good candidate can just be themselves.

Wheatley said she first heard about the program at the beginning of the year, and was intrigued by the opportunities it presented.

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“It sounded perfect,” she said. “SINSI is an amazing program, and the scholars that I have spoken to are great people with phenomenal stories about their time in the program. I wanted to be a part of it.”

For Eckstein and Lissanu, the essay portions were challenging.

“The longest essay asks you to sum up your commitment to and conception of public service in 1,000 words; writing this one was the hardest for me,” Eckstein said. “There were so many things I had to leave out in order to streamline the essay.”

Students also mentioned anxiety about the interview. Johnson said that the interview, with a panel of seven interviewers, challenged him to think on his feet.

“There was one question about the website for the Affordable Care Act,healthcare.gov, which crashed, and you’re the person in charge of managing the crisis,” he said.

Nedashkovskaya added that while the process was not as difficult or nerve-racking as it may have seemed in retrospect, one of her greatest uncertainties during the application process was waiting for the results.

Eckstein said he is planning on working in the Embassy in Santiago, Chile, this summer after a semester abroad. He said that he hopes to work in the State Department again and become a foreign service officer.

Johnson said he is considering working at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Justice, or the Department of Education. He said that he wants to become more involved in municipal governments and dealing with issues in communities, such as urban poverty.

Lissanu said she would like to work with the Department of Education, the Department of Justice, or the Department of Homeland Security. She hopes to do work that impacts policy in a way that affects others positively and aspires to become a lawyer in the future.

Nedashkovskaya said she is most interested in the Department of State and hopes to become a foreign service officer. However, she said that the beauty of the program is in its flexibility and hopes to be exposed to other fields such as the Department of Defense and the Department of Justice as well.

Wheatley said that she wants to work in an agency like the Center for Disease Control or National Institutes of Health, but said that she is still exploring her options. She said that her ultimate goal is to make the world a better place through work in the public health field.