Paul and Daisy Soros, Hungarian immigrants and American philanthropists, established their Fellowship program for New Americans in December 1997 with a charitable trust of fifty million dollars. Their reasons for doing so were several. They wished to “give back” to the country that had afforded them and their children such great opportunities and felt a fellowship program was an appropriate vehicle. They also felt that assisting young New Americans at critical points in their educations was an unmet need. Finally, they wished to call attention of all Americans to the extensive and diverse contributions of New Americans to the quality of life in this country.
In 2010, Mr. and Mrs. Soros contributed an additional $25 million to the charitable trust that funds their Fellowships for New Americans. For details, see the Wall Street Journal article.
Every year, The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans supports thirty New Americans, immigrants or the children of immigrants, who are pursuing graduate school in the United States. Full eligibility requirements can be found here.
Currently, Chidi is a second year MD-PhD student and campus leader at Harvard Medical School. He is involved with the WhiteCoat4BlackLives movement and the Student National Medical Association, where he works to increase the pipeline of underrepresented minority students in medicine. As a future physician-scientist, Chidi hopes to conduct pioneering research that contributes to the better treatment and cure of infectious diseases. See full bio: https://www.pdsoros.org/meet-the-fellows/chidiebere-akusobi
Currently, Lindsey is studying to complete a PhD at the University of California, Berkeley – University of California, San Francisco Graduate Program in Bioengineering. She plans to use algorithms to analyze and predict the functions of complex biological systems in her research, and later return to industry to create tools to make biological research more efficient. See full bio: https://www.pdsoros.org/meet-the-fellows/lindsey-osimiri
Previous winners of Nigerian origin:
