_____Honors & Awards_____
University of California Regents Special Fellowship, February 2013
•UC’s most prestigious Graduate Fellowship, for four years at UCSB’s Theater and Dance Department PhD program
Chattahoochee Review‘s Lamar York Prize for Nonfiction, February 2013
•For “Coyote”
Woon-Joon Yoon Memorial Fellowship, April 2012
•For “Indiana University students who have exemplified tolerance and understanding across racial and religious lines through service, personal commitment, academic achievement and future potential.” Won for travel to Bolivia summer 2012 to document the Rio Beni Health Project and translate contemporary Bolivian poetry.
USAID/Devex Worldwide Essay Competition, March 2012
•Essay on the Survival Girls one of five essays chosen in a global competition for inclusion in USAID’s “Frontiers in Development” publication, with contributions also by Bill Gates, Admiral Stavridis, Paul Collier, and Indra Nooyi
Wells Graduate Fellowship, February 2012
•Recipient of Indiana University’s largest Graduate Fellowship, “awarded to students who demonstrate the qualities for which Chancellor Wells was renowned: leadership abilities, academic excellence, character, social consciousness, and generosity of spirit”
AWP Intro Awards Nomination, November 2011
•For “Odette”, a nonfiction piece about working with refugee sex workers in Nairobi
Honorary Member, PEN Kenya, June 2011
International Enhancement Grant from Indiana University Graduate School, April 2011
•For the creation and implementation of creative writing workshops with young urban female refugees in Nairobi in collaboration with the UNHCR and the Great Globe Foundation
Runner Up, Best American Poetry Challenge, for “Please Hold”, January 2011
Speaker at Writers And Literary Translators International Congress 2010, Turkey
•Invited to present story of advocacy for exiled Mongolian Chinese writer for “Freedom of Expression” bracket of the Congress
Honorable Mention for New Millenium Writings competition, 2010
Louise McNutt Graduate Fellowship for study in the humanities, 2010
Nomination to Best American Short Stories by the editors of Cerise Press for fiction piece “Disturbing the Spirits”, 2009
Henry Luce Scholarship, International Relations Advisor to the Mongolian Writers Union, 2007-2008
Writers And Literary Translators International Congress Scholarship, 2008
•Presented paper on behalf of Mongolian Writers Union at inaugural conference in Stockholm
Brown University Kapstein Premium awarded to a senior who has done excellent work, 2007
Summer Literary Seminars Merit Scholarship for poetry workshop in St Petersburg, 2007
Juniper Summer Writing Institute Nomination and Scholarship, youngest recipient, 2006
Wesleyan Writing Conference Scholarship, youngest recipient, 2006
Michael Harper Poetry Service Assistantship for a Brown graduate or undergraduate to pursue pubic service project, 2006
•For writing Chumash Tribe legends based on interviews with tribal elder Tautahcho Muhuawit
Assatly Award for Praxis for essay submitted by a Brown graduate or undergraduate student, 2006
Creative Arts Council Grant to create the Brown Literary Review, fall 2005, spring 2006, and fall 2006
Michael Harper Poetry Service Assistantship, 2005
•For travel to Ecuador and Bolivia to write about family planning and rural health clinics
Barbara Banks Brodsky Prize for best creative manuscript submitted by Brown University junior or senior, 2005
Kim Ann Arstark Award for poetry submitted by a Brown graduate or undergraduate student, 2005
Pillsbury Scholarship for Creative Writing for college tuition, 2002 and 2003
Santa Barbara Foundation Writing Scholarship, Santa Barbara Writer’s Conference, youngest recipient, 2002
•Honorable Mention in Poetry
Cosby Fellowship, for Wesleyan Writers Conference and summer home-stay in Ecuador, 2001