Rising senior Danielle Tran, an English major minoring in Creative Writing and Education, has been selected as one of the outstanding undergraduates in the 2024 cohort of Beinecke Scholars. This prestigious scholarship provides $35,000 ($5,000 prior to graduate study and $15,000 per year) for two years of graduate study in the arts, humanities, or social sciences. Eighty colleges and universities from across the U.S. (including UC Berkeley) are invited to nominate one student for the scholarship, and twenty scholarships are awarded nationwide. Most Beinecke recipients are at the top of their class academically and demonstrate exceptional personal promise. Many plan to pursue careers in college teaching and research.
Raised in the Bay Area by Vietnamese parents, Danielle plans to pursue graduate study in either Comparative Literature or English. Their interest in and love of writing was instilled at an early age by their mother, a kindergarten teacher, and reinforced by their third grade teacher, the author of a series of children’s math books (starring the ever-resourceful protagonist: Sir Cumference!). Their interest in writing today is deep and broad, analytical and inclusive – poetry, editorials, essays, and, recently, the relationship between writing and artificial intelligence. Danielle, who is also the recipient of a two-year Mellon Mays Research Fellowship, is developing a senior honors thesis on linguistic discomfort and shared experience in the poetry of Romanian-French Holocaust survivor Paul Celan. Danielle’s other research interests include developing pedagogy for teaching poetry and literary analysis to nontraditional audiences, and studying the intersection of Asian and Latinx communities. They have also worked with Professor Timothy Tangherlini on a digital humanities project through URAP and are providing on-going editorial support for a volume on AI’s impact on language and creative writing by postdoctoral scholar Nina Beguš. Together, these projects attest to just some of the sophisticated ways in which their core interests in literature, writing, and education are intertwined.
Outside of the classroom, Danielle shares their passion for research and writing with other students through a variety of peer advising and mentoring positions. Their stellar academic record and active mentoring are paralleled by their long-term commitment to community engagement. Most recently, they have become a Scholar for The Immigrant Story (https://theimmigrantstory.org/), drawing on their own family’s immigrant experience to support others to share their stories. Other outreach commitments have included advocating for individuals with mental and health disabilities during the employment process, teaching in Early Childhood Education programs at the university and for underserved children, and supporting people experiencing homelessness in Barcelona, where Danielle studied in Spring 2024. Top all of that off with being an active member of Berkeley’s swing dance community, Lindy on Sproul!
Danielle is grateful for the mentorship provided by their professors and GSIs at Berkeley (shout-out to Prof. David Marno in the English department and PhD candidate Caroline Godard in the French department!) and looks forward to becoming an active member of the interdisciplinary Beinecke Scholar community.
Follow these links to learn more about the Beinecke Scholarship and the OURS National Scholarships & Experiential Fellowships Office.