Rising Alumni

Curtis Stewart

When Curtis Stewart was 3, his parents took him into a music store and told him to pick out an instrument. He did—the violin—and immediately began studies at the Diller-Quaile School of Music in New York City, his hometown. The son of a freelance violinist and a music educator at the Juilliard School, Stewart majors in violin at the Eastman School and in math at the College of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering. More

Danchi Nguyen

As a neuroscience and psychology major, Danchi Nguyen worked for 19 months in the lab of Maiken Nedergaard, a professor in the Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy and codirector of the Center for Translational Neuromedicine, where she gained a lot of respect for the “incredible intensity and dedication that scientists put into their work.” But it has been her involvement with Jumpstart, an AmeriCorps school-readiness program that matched her with both inner-city and suburban children, that cemented her future plans. More

Curtis Stewart

“I’m looking forward to really applying all the things I’ve learned in terms of being creative and analytical to any job I happen to get,” says Stewart, who plans to earn teaching certification in music or math—or both.

Outside school, he has tutored struggling math students and performed with numerous ensembles, including the New England Symphonic Ensemble at Carnegie Hall. In 2006, he was accepted into the two-month National Repertory Orchestra as section violinist and soloist. In 2007, he coordinated a two-day concert with more than 200 students at the Harlem School of the Arts, and this summer will be his third helping jazz cellist Akua Dixon teach hip hop licks on string instruments to children at Harlem’s Aaron Davis Hall.

“He’s not particularly garrulous or outgoing—I think he’s probably a bit shy—but he just does everything that he wants to do,” says Lynn Blakeslee, a professor of violin who has taught Stewart for four years.

Stewart’s classical-pop fusion band, NeoCollage, released City Nights, its first full-length CD, last fall.

Danchi Nguyen

“It’s the most important thing I’ve ever done in college. I can say that with confidence,” says Nguyen, who was deeply touched by how the geographical and socioeconomic disparities among her “partner children” affected their behavior.

She grew up in a middle-class neighborhood in Murray, Utah. “This really opened my eyes to what’s out there. It gave me a new idea about what I wanted to do with my life.”

To that end, she has lined up a Teach for America job as a middle school science teacher in an economically disadvantaged section of Phoenix.

Nguyen is “bubbly, outgoing, and a self-motivator,” says Stacey Fisher, assistant director of student activities. “She’s always held her ground, which has been encouraging because you can challenge her and she stays up to the challenge.”

Now a Jumpstart team leader, Nguyen is responsible for making sure members stay motivated and on task during their 300-hour-a-year commitments. She’s involved in the University’s Education Alliance, volunteered last year at St. Joseph’s Neighborhood Center (an agency that provides health care, education, and social work services to those without health insurance), and was student director of Wilson Day 2007.