IBES-affiliated students named 2026 Royce Fellows

Through the Swearer Center program, eight students affiliated with IBES will conduct community-engaged research spanning environmental justice, food sovereignty, conservation biology, and Indigenous land stewardship.

Established in 1996 through the generosity of Charles Royce ’61, the Swearer Center for Public Service’s Royce Fellowship supports Brown undergraduates as they carry out independent community-engaged research projects of their own design in locations across the United States and around the world. Fellows conduct their research under the guidance of a faculty member and/or a community partner.

Of this year’s 27 inductees, eight IBES-affiliated fellows are pursuing projects that reflect the Institute’s commitment to transdisciplinary environmental scholarship and community partnership.

Marissa Guadarrama Oropeza ’27

Concentrations: Environmental Storytelling (independent concentration) & International and Public Affairs.
Mentors: IBES Director of Undergraduate Studies Mindi Schneider and Director of Government and Community Relations for Para Los Niños Carla Lopez-Valdez.
Project title: Reclaiming Space: La Lucha for Environmental Equity and Belonging in Los Angeles.

Jules Ho ’27

Concentrations: Environmental Sciences and Studies (Brown) & Illustration (RISD).
Mentor: Tyler Kartzinel, Associate Professor of Environment and Society & Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology.
Project title: Conserving the Sloth Holobiont: Using the Gastrointestinal Microbiome to Understand the Effects of Habitat Change on Costa Rican Sloth Health.

Bennett Lacerte ’27

Concentration: Urban Studies.
Mentor: IBES Director of Undergraduate Studies Mindi Schneider.
Project title: From Disinvestment to Food Sovereignty: Resilience in Urban Agriculture from Havana to Providence.

Gavin Li ’28

Concentrations: Biochemistry & Molecular Biology.
Mentor: Marianthi-Anna Kioumourtzoglou, Professor of Environment and Society & Epidemiology.
Project title: Addressing the Divergence between Regulatory Air Monitoring and Pedestrian-Level Air Quality in Bay Area Communities with High Respiratory Vulnerability.

Maitri Niles ’27

Concentration: International and Public Affairs.
Mentors: IBES Director of Undergraduate Studies Mindi Schneider and Native American environmentalist, activist, and author Winona LaDuke.
Project title: Oshki Ikwewag: How Indigenous Farmers are Leading a Just Transition to a Local Food System.

Telijah Patterson ’26.5

Concentration: Africana Studies.
Mentor: IBES Director of Undergraduate Studies Mindi Schneider.
Project title: Modern Maroonage in Practice: Learning From Black Land and Food Initiatives Through Participatory, Community-Engaged Research.

Isidora Stevens ’28

Concentration: Environmental Sciences and Studies.
Mentors: Dov Sax, Professor of Environment and Society & Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biologym and Aparajita Majumdar, Assistant Professor of Environment and Society & History.
Project title: Nuevomexicano and Multispecies Life Amidst Drought and Ecosystem Shifts Along the Upper Rio Grande River Basin.

Alexa Theodoropoulos ’27

Concentrations: Environmental Sciences and Studies & Narrative Studies (independent concentration)
Mentor: Assistant Professor History Anthony Medrano.
Project title: John Hay, Thomasites, and Tagalog: The Hi(Story) of Brown University's Empire in the Philippines.

Congratulations to all of the awardees!

Institute at Brown for Environment and Society