Students honored for leadership and service at Class Day
Members of Princeton University’s Class of 2021 celebrated the end of their undergraduate careers with a virtual Class Day ceremony honoring their achievements and leadership. The program was livestreamed on Saturday, May 15.
The Allen Macy Dulles ’51 Award was given to Kelton Chastulik of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. The award recognizes a senior whose activities at Princeton best exemplify the University’s informal motto, “Princeton in the nation’s service and the service of humanity.” Chastulik is a School of Public and International Affairs concentrator who is also earning a certificate in values and public life. He launched a book drive that has provided books for homeless shelters, prisons and community centers. He helped create a podcast called “Chambersburg to College” that provides inspiration and navigational assistance to students in his hometown. He has been a member of the Pace Center Civic Leadership Council and a community ambassador with the Emma Bloomberg Center for Access and Opportunity. He is a member of Whitman College.
Ashley Hodges of Fredericksburg, Virginia, received the Frederick Douglass Service Award, established in 1969 at the recommendation of Carl Fields, who was assistant dean of the college. The award is given to a senior who has exhibited “courage, leadership, intellectual achievement and a willingness to contribute unselfishly toward a deeper understanding of the experiences of racial minorities and who, in so doing, reflects the tradition of service embodied in education at Princeton.” Hodges is a concentrator in African American studies. She served as an intern at the Ida B. Wells Just Data Lab, where she analyzed prison data to track epidemics and their impact on vulnerable populations. At the Mpala Research Centre in Kenya, she helped grade school students in an effort to address gender-based disparities in dropout rates. A member of Butler College, she was an intern at the Carl A. Fields Center and served as a tutor for the Petey Greene Program.
The Harold Willis Dodds Achievement Prize was presented to Mary DeVellis of Boston. The award recognizes the senior who best embodies the qualities of Princeton’s 15th president, Harold Dodds, “particularly in the qualities of clear thinking, moral courage, a patient and judicious regard for the opinions of others, and a thoroughgoing devotion to the welfare of the University and to the life of the mind.” DeVellis is an anthropology concentrator and is also earning certificates in African studies, gender and sexuality studies, and global health and health policy. She has been awarded the George B. Wood Legacy Sophomore Prize, the Shapiro Prize for Academic Excellence and a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. She has served as president of Princeton Students for Reproductive Justice and as a board member for the American Society for Emergency Contraception. She has also worked as an intern at Princeton’s Women*s Center and as a volunteer with Princeton’s Best Buddies program, which matches student mentors with people with intellectual disabilities. DeVellis is a member of Butler College.
The W. Sanderson Detwiler 1903 Prize was awarded to Emma Parish of Tenafly, New Jersey. The prize is given to a senior who, in the judgment of the student’s classmates, has done the most for the class. Parish is a School of Public and International Affairs concentrator who is also earning a certificate in Asian American studies. She is senior class president and has been a member of the Princeton Undergraduate Student Government since her first year on campus. A member of Whitman College, Parish was a residential college adviser.
Morgan Smith of Los Angeles was given the Walter E. Hope Class of 1901 Medal. The award recognizes the senior who, in the judgment of the student’s classmates, has done the most for Princeton. A member of First College, Smith is a School of Public and International Affairs concentrator and is earning a certificate in African American studies. She served as the first Black woman president of the American Whig-Cliosophic Society, the oldest collegiate literary and debating club in the nation. She also was a cohort leader with Princeton’s Vote100, a student voting and civic engagement initiative. After graduation, she will be a Princeton Project ’55 Fellow with Chicago Volunteer Legal Services.
The Priscilla Glickman ’92 Memorial Prize — which is given to a Princeton senior who has demonstrated independence and imagination in the area of community service, seeks knowledge and purposeful adventure in unfamiliar cultures and maintains strong academic work — was awarded to Daniela Alvarez of Miami. A Spanish and Portuguese concentrator, she is a member of Princeton’s first cohort of transfer students since 1990 and co-founded the Princeton Transfer Association as a space for transfer students to engage with the broader undergraduate community. As a co-project leader of El Centro, she taught English as a Second Language to adult immigrants in Trenton. She also led curriculum development workshops for her fellow volunteers and gathered data on ESL students’ experiences. She is a member of Whitman College.
Athletic awards
The Class of 1916 Cup was presented to Oliver Schwartz of Sydney, Australia. The award, which was established by the Class of 1916 on the occasion of its 50th reunion, is presented to the senior varsity letter winner with the highest academic standing. Schwartz is a computer science concentrator and a member of the men’s heavyweight rowing team, where he has led both third and fourth varsity eights to silver medals at Eastern Sprints. He is an Academic All-Ivy honoree. Schwartz is president of the Princeton chapter of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society and has served as a teaching assistant in the computer science department. A member of Rockefeller College, he was awarded the Shapiro Prize for Academic Excellence.
The William Winston Roper Trophy was awarded to Daniel Kwak of Los Angeles. The trophy, awarded since 1936, goes to “a male senior of high scholastic rank and outstanding qualities of sportsmanship and general proficiency in athletics.” Kwak, a psychology concentrator, was a two-time All-American for Princeton men’s fencing and was the national runner-up in the NCAA saber championship in 2019. Kwak captured the 2020 NCAA regional title en route to qualifying for the NCAA championships for the third consecutive season. He is a two-year team captain and Academic All-Ivy honoree. A member of First College, Kwak serves as a college adviser with Matriculate, which provides support to high-achieving, low-income students.
The C. Otto von Kienbusch Award was given to Clara Roth of Schwetzingen, Germany. The award recognizes the top senior sportswoman at Princeton. Roth, an architecture concentrator, served as captain of the field hockey team, which won two Ivy League titles and two NCAA Final Fours. She is a three-time All-Ivy honoree and two-time All-American. As a junior, Roth was named a Honda Sport Award Finalist and Regional Player of the Year, becoming one of only 11 players in the program’s history to record 100 career points. She is a member of Athlete Ally and has served as a student-athlete wellness leader and EcoRep leader on Princeton’s Greening Athletics team. She is a member of Whitman College.
The Arthur Lane ’34 Citizen Athlete Award honors selfless contribution to sport and society by an undergraduate athlete. This year the honor was shared by Melia Chittenden of Huntington Beach, California, and Matthew Marquardt of Cincinnati, Ohio.
Chittenden, a School of Public and International Affairs concentrator, is a two-time captain of the cross country and track and field teams, and a First Team All-Ivy honoree. She helped lead her team’s work with the Smith Family Foundation in Trenton, providing headphones to 2,000 underprivileged students. She has also tutored incarcerated individuals, supported immigration efforts for the International Rescue Committee and contributed to the Trenton Project. Chittenden is a member of First College.
Marquardt, a chemistry concentrator, is a backstroke and butterfly specialist for the men’s swimming and diving team. In 2019, he received the Slavin Fellowship for his entrepreneurship work on campus. Marquardt has tutored underprivileged children and served as a patient care ambassador at Penn Medicine Princeton Medical Center. He recently completed a 20-day cross-country bike ride that raised more than $13,000 for pediatric cancer research. He is a member of Rockefeller College.
Honorary class members
The Class of 2021 also recognized the following people as honorary class members: Ian Deas, assistant dean of undergraduate students and director of student leadership and engagement; Robin Izzo, executive director of environmental health and safety; Sameer Khan, owner of Fotobuddy Photography; author, comedian and “The Daily Show” host Trevor Noah, Class Day speaker; Rabbi Julie Roth, executive director of Princeton’s Center for Jewish Life; Allison Slater Tate, president of the Class of 1996; and Gary Walsh, vice president of the Class of 1971.
