The Margaret McBride Lehrman Graduate Scholarship derives from a very generous endowment that provides support for graduate students with financial need and pursuing the use of communication, particularly through writing, to educate and effect change.
Learn more about the Margaret McBride Lehrman Graduate Scholarship.
2024-25 Scholarship Recipients
Will Arangelov
Communication and Media Studies
Will Arangelov is a first-generation doctoral student in Communication and Media Studies at the University of Oregon. He is a proud member of the Esports and Game Research Lab. Will’s interests include gaming communications, Esports, interpersonal, and health communications. His primary research focuses on intergenerational gaming as a tool to negate ageism stereotypes, toxicity, and create a better community among the players. He has experience as a research and teaching assistant at Shanghai Jiao Tong University (China) and the University of National and World Economy (Bulgaria). Will worked as a freelance journalist for many years, reporting on politics, sports, and Esports.
Nahla Bendefaa
Communication and Media Studies
Nahla Bendefaa (she/her) is a Moroccan American media scholar, producer, and educator pursuing a PhD in Communication and Media Studies at the University of Oregon. She holds an MA in Global Communication from Kent State University and a BA in Communication Studies, with a media studies emphasis, from Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane. Nahla has worked in public radio, non-profit journalism, agricultural communication, and digital content strategy for regional and national organizations. Her research, teaching, and professional experience are deeply interdisciplinary, bridging digital communication, global media systems, and journalism. Through her dissertation, she studies digital foodways as sites of resistance, meaning making, and identity formation and contestation. Nahla's work is motivated by a commitment to understanding how media narratives shape national identity and public discourse, and by an ambition to contribute to socially impactful research that can inform policy and advocacy efforts.
Previous Awardees
2023-2024 Recipient
Nishat Parvez
Communication and Media Studies
Nishat Parvez is a Communication and Media Studies doctoral student at the University of Oregon. Her focus is on political communication, especially informal political spaces. Nishat started her career as a journalist; later, she moved to academia. She is an associate professor (on leave) at the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Jahangirnagar University in Bangladesh. Besides, she worked as a research assistant at the University of Oregon, the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (Delhi), and the University of Bergen (Norway).
2022-23 Recipients
Ivy Fofie
Communication and Media Studies
Ivy Fofie earned a PhD in Communication and Media Studies from the University of Oregon in 2024 and is currently an assistant professor in Communcations Studies at Loyola Marymount University. Her current research explores the history, political economy, and gendered content of women working in local language media in the global south. Her work has appeared in journals such as Feminist Media Studies, Journal of African Media Studies, Critical Studies in Media Communication, and several edited books. Before coming to the UO, she worked as an assistant professor at the University of Ghana teaching courses in journalism, public relations, and gender studies. She is currently the editor of an online African women's magazine, written for and by women, called FemInStyle Africa.
Stephen Ssenkaaba
Communication and Media Studies
Stephen Ssenkaaba is a PhD candidate in Communication and Media Studies at the University of Oregon. His research interests are focused on African indigenous storytelling and its influence on how journalists report news in a digitized environment. Stephen is also interested in new media, digital platforms, and how they are being adapted in African newsrooms and other communication settings, especially among marginalized groups. Prior to his experience at the UO, Stephen worked for more than 10 years as a features writer, contributing editor and online writer at the New Vision newspaper in Uganda, while providing consultancy services to domestic and international non-profit organizations operating in Uganda.
2021-2022 Recipient
Junha Jung
English
Junha Jung earned a PhD in English from the University of Oregon in 2024. His dissertation is titled “Multiethnic Intellectual Traditions and Reinvention of America in Early Twentieth-Century Ethnic American Literature.” Junha has stayed on at the UO as an assistant professor in the English Department focusing on multiethnic American literature, anthropology and literature, and multimodal composition.
2020-2021 Recipients
Elinam Amevor
Communication and Media Studies
Elinam Amevor graduated with a PhD in Communication and Media Studies from the University of Oregon in 2022. Elinam is currently working as an assistant professor of Communications at the University of Pittsburgh-Bradford after working as an assistant professor of Professional Communications at Minot State University. His research interests include the question of ethics in philanthropy-journalism in sub-Saharan Africa, critical approach to global health, communication for development and social change, and cultural sensitivity in health crisis communication.
June Manuel
English
June Manuel graduated with a PhD in English in 2022 from the University of Oregon, with a concentration on rhetoric and composition. Since 2022 June has worked as a Grants Coordinator for Ecosystem Support Program at the Ethereum Foundation, a non-profit that empowers developers to produce the next generation of decentralized applications towards a more trustworthy internet.
2019-2020 Recipient
Daniel Daly
Music Composition
Daniel Daly earned a PhD in Music Composition from the University of Oregon in 2023. As both a musician and writer, Daniel regularly creates works that bring music and text together. In 2017, he composed The Banshee, a chamber opera that premiered at the Music Today Festival in Eugene. His standalone opera scenes My House Is Ancient (2016) and My Quiet One (2018) were performed by Grammy-winning soprano Estelí Gomez at the Oregon Bach Festival Composers Symposium. His academic capstone project, Our Neighbor John: an Opera in Two Acts (2023) is currently available to view online.
2018-2019 Recipients
Celine Khatija De Clercq
Interdisciplinary Studies
Celine Khatija De Clercq earned an interdisciplinary MS in neuroscience, educational leadership, and media studies from the University of Oregon in 2019. Her thesis, “Tech-Savvy Teachers: A Case Study Investigating the Relationship between Teachers’ Perceptions of Mobile Devices, Participation in Optional Professional Development, and Application Usage in Classrooms,” explored how technology can be used to improve educational practices. A first-generation American, raised by her Bangladeshi grandmother, Celine was inspired by her parents’ resilience. Her father was incarcerated while her mother raised five daughters as a receptionist. She previously worked as a substitute teacher at Jesuit High School and now serves as a Senior Communications Specialist for the Multnomah Education Service District in Portland, Oregon.
Lorna Porter
Quantitative Research Methods in Education
Lorna Porter completed her PhD in Quantitative Research Methods in Education at the University of Oregon in 2022. Her research focused on quantitative research methods in education and strengthening the public education system for students from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Prior to her doctoral studies, she earned an MA from UC Davis and a BA from UC Berkeley, and worked in Oakland, Rio de Janeiro, and California refugee resettlement programs. Fluent in Portuguese, she now serves as Research Manager at WestEd, working with the English Learner and Migrant Education Services team in Kingston, Washington.
Gabrielle Sullivan
Strategic Communication
Gabby Sullivan graduated with a MA in Strategic Communication from the University of Oregon in 2021. She currently works as a writing coach and brand consultant for small businesses. Previously, Gabby was the Events and Communication Coordinator for Habitat for Humanity of the Mid-Willamette Valley, an organization that partners with low-income families in the Salem/Keizer area to build and buy a safe, decent, and affordable home, and engages in social enterprises to fund this home-building mission.
2017-2018 Recipients
- Irene Awino, Media Studies
- Michelle Kyoko Crowson, Comparative Literature
2016-2017 Recipient
- Ross Anderson, Educational Leadership
2015-2016 Recipients
- Brian Allen Gazaille, English
- Michael Their, Educational Leadership
2014-2015 Recipient
- Jane Ridgeway, Creative Writing
2013-2014 Recipient
- Zanne Miller, Counseling, Family, and Human Services
2012-2013 Recipients
- Blessing Abbah, Conflict and Dispute Resolution
- Kelley Lynn McCann, Counseling, Family, and Human Services
- Marisa Starr Silver, Educational Leadership
2011-2012 Recipients
- Kato M. T. Buss, Theater Arts
- Kelley Gree Littlepage, Political Science
- Marisa Starr Silver, Educational Leadership
2010-2011 Recipient
- Timothy Asay, English