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Twenty rising sophomores are spending the summer completing career-related experiences through First-Year Forward, through Hamilton’s Career Center. At the beginning of the year these students committed to regular group meetings, career counseling session, and skill-building assignments. Their goals are to develop skills in communication, networking and interviewing, and to assess their own strengths and career interests. Internships this summer will help them to define and build toward career goals. Betsy Ramirez ’19 is interning in the marketing and communications division of New York City’s Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA).

Building on data from  the 2016 Hamilton College Levitt Poll titled “The Russian Elite 2016,” a group of students this summer is researching the diffusion of foreign models into Russia through a Levitt Center grant.

As a high school student, Andres Aguilar ’19 participated in the Pomona College Academy for Youth Success (PAYS), an intensive summer program that prepares underrepresented students for admission to selective colleges. Now, after his first year at Hamilton, through the First Year Forward program, he is returning to PAYS to work as a trainer, helping students to succeed in the same way he has succeeded. His plans don’t stop there, either; Aguilar has big goals for helping even more high school students in the future.

Claire Han ’19 is working this summer as a software development intern at Resource Systems Group (RSG) in White River Junction, Vt. RSG, Han explained, is “a consulting firm that offers services in transportation planning, market strategy, and custom software development.” Han, who is a prospective computer science major, aims to learn as much as possible about different aspects of software development. As an intern, Han said every day is a bit different, and she’s working on a variety of projects. Some of her work includes translating code, while other days she attends department meetings or participates in training. This means she gets to learn not only about software development, but about consulting.

More than 17 percent of Utica’s population was born outside of the United States, and a drive through the city reveals numerous stores, churches and community centers built up by diverse ethnic groups. Despite the prevalence of immigrants in Utica, however, refugees face significant challenges to assimilating into the community. Understanding these challenges is the goal of a Levitt Research Group this summer. Erica Chen ’19, Audrey Nadler ’18 and Sofia Rachad ’18, with the guidance of Professor of Economics Erol Balkan, are researching the experiences of refugees in Utica.

Twenty rising sophomores are spending the summer completing career-related experiences through First-Year Forward, a program run by Hamilton’s Career and Life Outcomes Center. Their goals are to develop skills in communication, networking and interviewing, and to assess their own strengths and career interests. Internships this summer will help them to define and build toward career goals. Eddie Brennan ’19 is interning at the Fountainhead Group.

Over the past decade, bees have been dying and colonies collapsing in unprecedented numbers, posing a threat not only to the bees themselves, but to the many crops they pollinate. Scientists are still working to understand all the factors that pose risks to bees. This summer, Andre Burnham ’18 and Fiona McLaughlin ’19 are contributing their own research to this important question by comparing the fitness of locally raised queen bees and queen bees imported from California.

Cyrus Boga ’90, an expert in social entrepreneurship, recently returned to the Hill as a Levitt Center Innovator-in-Residence to hold workshops and meet with students. Boga is the CEO and founder of Novamaya, an education startup serving college students, and the CEO of Campus Properties LLC, a venture offering student housing solutions. He also has experience in investment banking, corporate finance and running a successful social enterprise.

Khat is a plant that is widely used but also widely debated because of its psychostimulant effects. This summer Leonard Kilekwang ’16 researched the effects of khat (also known as miraa) on mice at the department of Medical Physiology at the University of Nairobi, Kenya. His research will provide important results for people and government organizations trying to determine whether khat is safe.

For Sarah Wallack ’16 this summer, an art museum was much more than simply a place to look at paintings; it was a place to find inspiration and to share it. As a studio art intern in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts’  (MFA) education department, she helped to teach children’s art classes through the museum’s Journeys Through Art summer program. As a Hamilton art major she also found inspiration for her own work.