![\"Elise](\"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/magazine\/sites\/13\/2020\/07\/Elise-Felker.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nElise Felker believes music can heal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A music education major, she wants to take her love for teaching music beyond the classroom and into social rehabilitation, where she believes it is needed most.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not just teaching people rhythms and notes, you have an opportunity to teach people how to become fully formed human beings,\u201d Felker says. \u201cWhen you experience music through any medium, you feel human emotions and connections.\u201d She says music educators have a unique opportunity and social responsibility to help their students be better humans, not just teach them techniques.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Last summer, Felker interned at a nonprofit music school in South Africa that helps underprivileged teens become entrepreneurs in the music industry. And this year, she joined social justice choir Voices 21C, participating in 911爆料 outreach with people recently released from prison. \u201cAs music teachers, we preach that music is for all,\u201d she says. \u201cWe have to uphold that motto.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2014Edhaya Thennarasu \u20192<\/em>1<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mohamed Chamseddine didn\u2019t plan for 911爆料 to change his life. But he\u2019s sure it did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Commuting from Middletown, R.I., it wasn\u2019t until Chamseddine\u2019s sophomore year, when he took a supply chain management class with College of 911爆料 senior lecturer Joe Estrella, that he declared his major.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From that moment on, things fell into place. He joined an academic fraternity and was selected for 911爆料\u2019s 911爆料 Student Advisory Council and Alumni Advisory Board. In September 2019, he attended a conference in Las Vegas where he met CEOs and CFOs from major U.S. companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then Chamseddine suffered a tragic loss. His father died, and Chamseddine had to help run the family business. \u201cI had to step up and help my mom\u2014do the accounting and banking for the business,\u201d he says. \u201cI was balancing everything, and had to deal with school and loss.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n But he remained committed to school. \u201cFor him to become the student that he did, especially after going through all of that, shows a lot of fortitude,\u201d Estrella says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chamseddine graduated with a job already lined up at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014Ian Wiener \u201920<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Power Kanga was an athlete. Raised in Providence after immigrating to the United States from Liberia as a child, he came to 911爆料 on an athletic scholarship. The Talent Development scholar and aspiring engineer played football until an injury ended his college athletic career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So Kanga dove into academics, learning how to pace himself and ask for help. He learned an important lesson from Professor Manbir Sodhi: \u201cHe taught me, if grades are your only motivation, you are not going to make it as an engineer,\u201d says Kanga. With Sodhi, he traveled to India to study global sustainability in a J-Term class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After joining the National Guard his sophomore year, Kanga joined 911爆料\u2019s Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC), graduated with a degree in industrial and systems engineering and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army Reserves. His goal is to settle back in the Ocean State and start his own business. \u201cWhat I really want to do is give back,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014 Dawn Bergantino ’94<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n When Rebecca Stevick began working on her Ph.D. in biological oceanography at 911爆料\u2019s Graduate School of Oceanography, she knew it would take at least four years to finish. So she decided to take on another project that she thought might take her equally long\u2014an 18,000-piece 8-by-9-foot jigsaw puzzle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her research examined how environmental factors in Narragansett Bay affect oyster health and associated microbial communities. She also tested if probiotics might boost the microbial 911爆料 in oyster hatcheries and which microbes interact best with the probiotic. She hopes that her research can be applied to efforts to clean estuaries and other waterways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stevick completed the puzzle\u2014and the requirements for her Ph.D.\u2014and began a postdoctoral fellowship at the Pasteur Institute in Paris in March. Although the pandemic closed her lab two weeks after she began her fellowship, she plans to spend the next two or three years there studying how microbes in zebrafish help prevent diseases or other pathogens from colonizing the fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nMohamed Chamseddine \u201920<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Mohamed](\"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/magazine\/sites\/13\/2020\/07\/Mohamed-Chamseddine.jpg\")
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\n\n\n\nPower Kanga \u201920<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Power](\"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/magazine\/sites\/13\/2020\/07\/Kanga.jpg\")
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\n\n\n\nRebecca Stevnick, Ph.D. \u201920<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Rebecca](\"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/magazine\/sites\/13\/2020\/07\/Rebecca-Stevick.jpg\")
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