Jonsson School Alum Named Schwarzman Scholar
A alum of the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science has been named a Schwarzman Scholar, a highly selective award that funds a one-year master’s degree in global affairs at Tsinghua University in Beijing.
Neel Reddy BS’19 joins Carla Ramazan BA’21, a political science graduate of The University of Texas at Dallas. Both will begin studies in August and were previously named Eugene McDermott Scholars. They are the third and fourth UT Dallas recipients of the award, joining previous scholars Matthew Salm BS’18 and Carlos Rodriguez-Cruz y Celis BS’19.
Dr. Douglas C. Dow, interim dean of the Hobson Wildenthal Honors College and director of UTD’s Office of Distinguished Scholarships, said the recognition reflects the Schwarzman Foundation’s broad investment in global leadership in a wide variety of fields.
Reddy, a mechanical engineering graduate, served as a Student Ambassador at UTD. After graduation, he worked at Bain & Company, consulting for international food brands, and now works at Vow, a cultivated meat company based in Australia.
He has long been interested in increasing accessibility to sustainable, healthy food — both to alleviate the global crisis of climate change and to address the problems of increasing obesity and its related health risks, he said. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he co-founded the nonprofit Feed the Front Line, which raised more than $600,000 to supply front-line health care workers in Texas with more than 50,000 meals. He also served as director of sales for Campus Oven, which provided college students with healthy, affordable and convenient meals prepared by professional chefs.
Applying for the Schwarzman program was an easy decision, Reddy said.
“I was immediately mesmerized by this cohort of impressive young leaders dedicated to fixing issues between the East and West,” he said.
Reddy was among 150 scholars selected from an initial pool of nearly 3,000 applicants. The members of the program’s seventh cohort hail from 32 countries and 106 universities.
A version of this story appeared in News Center.