2022 Summer Graduate Interns in the Social Sciences Announced
The Office of the Associate Provost for Graduate Affairs, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GRS) and the Center for Innovation in Social Science (CISS) are pleased to support nine outstanding graduate students as part of the Boston University’s 2022 Summer Graduate Internships in the Social Sciences program. The program provides stipend-supported summer internships aimed at introducing PhD students in Social Sciences fields (including PhD students in Anthropology, History, Political Science, and Sociology) and related disciplines to career opportunities at institutions beyond academia. Interns bring to their roles the skills developed during their PhD training, including research, writing, substantive expertise, while also learning new skills under the mentorship of their site supervisors. Meet the graduate interns below!
Graham Albert (he/him/his) is a PhD candidate in the Anthropology Department, focusing on biological anthropology. Albert looks at how facial appearance affects interpersonal perceptions. In particular, he looks at how certain facial characteristics affect dominance perceptions.
Albert is working as the Data Analytics Intern for the Boston University Office of the Provost and Academic Affairs. He is working with Neena Verma, Assistant Provost for Academic Data and Decision Support (ADDS) to apply the skills he has gained from his PhD to analyze survey data. As an intern, he will strengthen his data science skills, bringing him closer to a career goal as a data scientist conducting research for governments to inform energy and natural resources policy.
Olivia Britton (she/her/hers) is a PhD Candidate in the Political Science Department. Her research explores the political, social, and economic webs that shape refugee integration experiences on the ground. In particular, she focuses on how integration policies’ legal discourse diverges from the reality of those affected in Southern European countries.
Britton is a summer intern at BU’s Center for Antiracist Research (CAR). She is working with Dr. Monica L. Wang, Chair of the Narrative Office, to apply the skills she has gained from her PhD to conduct exhaustive racial research and contribute toward research-based policy innovation. As an intern, Olivia will grow her toolkit for best approaches in presenting evidence-based policy correctives accessible to the public, bringing her closer to a career goal as a liaison between academia and NGOs.
Sean Case (he/him/his) is a PhD candidate in the American & New England Studies Program. Sean’s primary field of study is modern U.S. political history, and he studies the balance of power as an ideology from the interwar period to the Cold War. His dissertation focuses on the balance of power as an ideology animating conceptions of international society and traces. Realist thought through the twin ascendancies of the military and defense intellectual. 
Chawannuch Chaikulngamdee (she/her/hers) is a PhD student in the School of Communication, focusing on emerging media studies. Her research examines the intersections of digital technologies and race, specifically how racial attitudes are shaped and expressed in virtual spaces.
Chaikulngamdee is a summer intern with the Prisoners’ Legal Services of Massachusetts. This nonprofit and anti-racist organization advocates equity and the humane treatment of incarcerated people in the Commonwealth. To further their Racial Equity in Corrections Initiative (REICI), she is helping to analyze the 1,300 surveys sent out to Massachusetts BIPOC prisoners asking about their experiences with institutional racism. The survey results will be used to advocate for legislation to remedy discrimination in the prison system. This opportunity will provide her with a deeper understanding of the multifaceted systemic issues that black Americans face to guide her future research goals and evoke change.
Leyla Jafarova is a PhD candidate in the Anthropology Department, focusing on socio-cultural anthropology. She is researching social legacies and consequences of the Nagono-Karabakh war,focusing on the emergence of alternative forms of knowledge as well as gendered experiences of uncertainty.
Jafarova is interning with the Lynn Racial Justice Coalition (more info here), a local grassroots organizing in Lynn, Massachusetts. She is working with the Coalition to develop an alternative to police response to mental health crisis situations. This position offers Jafarova an excellent opportunity to gain experience and skills on the path to becoming an applied anthropologist.
Rachel Monsey (she/her/hers) is a Ph.D. candidate in the History Department. Monsey studies seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Great Britain with a focus on intellectual history under Dr. Arianne Chernock.
Monsey is interning with Partners in Health (PIH) on an intentional effort to apply interdisciplinary approaches to complex problems in global health. She is researching historical moments of change for critical donors in their funding initiatives that pertain to community health workers. By applying the skills she has acquired during her PhD, she is assembling a comprehensive narrative of the past to show that PIH can effectively deploy in service of its universalist mission of health and hope.
Yunjie Song is a Ph.D. student in Economics Department. Her research interests lie in industrial organization. Song is interning with the Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development, designing a survey to evaluate the Emergency Rental Assistance Program launched during the Covid pandemic. The internship will allow Song to work in the public sector and solve real-world problems, providing her with new insights into policy design and program evaluation.
Leping Wang (she/her/hers) is a PhD student in the Sociology Department. Wang’s research interests include occupational mobility, social inequality and stratification, education, and life course trajectories. As a sociologist trained in quantitative methods, she is interested in leveraging statistical models and mixed methods to inquire into the broad subject of social inequality and stratification, particularly in education, health, occupation, and race and ethnicity.
Wang is interning for The Center for Mind and Culture, a non-profit research organization in Boston. She is using this opportunity to better understand the intersection of sociology of education and sociology of religion. Wang is focusing specifically on the link between change in religiosity and educational attainment across time to gain more hands-on experiences in longitudinal analysis.
Yibin Yang (he/him/his) is a PhD student in the School of Social Work. His research interests focus on preventing mental health challenges and promoting psychological well-being for school-aged children and youth living in socially disadvantaged situations. He is interested in designing and implementing mental health programs and services for young children and their caregivers from diverse backgrounds.
Yang is working with experts in early childhood from the United Way Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley to explore strategies to enhance infants’ and young children’s social and emotional development in the post-pandemic era. This internship opportunity will give Yang valuable insights into implementing evidence-based practices from both researcher and practitioner perspectives.