Braden Storytelling Grants - 2024 Cohort

2024 Braden Grant Projects

Our 2024 cohort included stories from Ethiopia, Peru, Guam, and the United States. Listen here to hear what our 2024 grantees had to say about their experience.

Fadie Arabo

Fadie is a sophomore studying biology and education. He wants to share his experience as one of the only Chaldean-Americans on Stanford’s campus to research this unheard of community to many. Come on a journey with him as he explores who Chaldeans are, their place of community, and their unique culture from Iraq to the USA.
Location: USA
Listen to Fadie's audio story: The Chaldean Conundrum

Langston Buddenhagen

Langston is a junior majoring in Urban Studies and pursuing a coterminal master's degree in public policy. Born and raised in Oakland, California, he is passionate about advancing equity through policy and urbanism--and now, storytelling. Langston has cherished podcasts since middle school, and he's excited to create his own that investigates the narratives of urban change in Addis Ababa that chronicle its conflict, growth, and resilience. 
Location: Ethiopia
Listen to Langston's Audio Story: New Flowers

Natasha Zia Charfauros

As a Chamoru and Filipina woman majoring in Human Biology and minoring in Economics, Natasha Zia is interested in understanding how to create sustainable economic systems for human health and culture and loves learning about culture, language, and food systems.
Location: Guam
Listen to Natasha's Audio Story: The Voices of Those Who Came Before Us

Viva Donohoe

Viva Donohoe is a junior studying American Studies with a concentration in Silicon Valley, Digital Culture, and the American Experience. She was raised in San Francisco. Her project examines Patsy Cline's legacy, and how the 1960's country music industry taught Appalachian women how to behave.
Location: USA
Listen to Viva's Audio Story: Hillbilly Highway

Jenny Duan

Jenny Duan studies Symbolic Systems and Data Science. Her fascination with understanding Chinatowns began during high school, when she started filming video documentaries sharing the stories of Chinatown residents in her hometown, Portland, Oregon. She looks for a Chinatown in every city she visits. Through the lens of food and Lima's "Chifa" cuisine, Jenny's project explores how Lima's Chinatown has influenced the development of a unique Chinese-Peruvian identity and its place in the wider (South American) Chinese diaspora.
Location: Lima, Peru
Listen to Jenny's Audio Story: A Taste of Tusán

Cassie Mylia-Frances Shaw

Cassie Shaw: the girl, the myth, the legend… is a zealous creative of nearly every medium under the Sun. Her English, Creative Writing major acts as an umbrella to explore poetry, screen and fiction writing, comic creation, and audio storytelling. This junior’s passion for creation stems from a desire to develop a space for digestible social commentaries and an opportunity for people to learn about different lands, cultures, and experiences — especially Korea (which she studies as an E.A.S. minor to cultivate deeper ties to her heritage). Every year there are students who don’t walk the stage at graduation and don’t earn their degree despite the blood, sweat, tears, and years put into preparing for and attending their 'elite' university. The decision to leave cannot be easy, which begs the question: why? In this podcast we will hear from elite school dropouts about what pushed them to leave, and might just dispel myths about academic burnout and entrepreneurship in the process. In her quest to dispel myths about Dropout culture and raise awareness about systemic issues in elite universities, her project uncovers what pushes students from top universities to drop out.
Location: USA
Listen to Cassie's Audio Story: The Stanford Stopout

Priyanka Shrestha

Priyanka Shrestha (she/her) is a senior studying computer science on the biocomputation track with a minor in creative writing. Priyanka's father is an infectious disease physician, and through spending a lot of time in and around hospitals with him in her childhood, she nurtured an early fascination for science and medicine. Now, as an aspiring physician herself, Priyanka seeks to better understand how we can best leverage technology to improve medical knowledge and practice without sacrificing the human connection that is at its core. Digital Diagnosis explores the history of the medical exam from its humble roots of tapping different part of the body to the modern day routine, and ask how has the integration of technology into medical decision and diagnosis-making changed the meaning and impact of this ritual for both physicians and patients.
Location: USA
Listen to Priyanka's Audio Story: Digital Diagnosis

Alex Strong

Alex Strong is a Designer - storyteller, craftsman, tinkerer - at Stanford University. He believes in curious methodical exploration of whatever issue is at hand. He loves making things and is always excited to talk about plants and anything else in the outdoors. His project is about how climbers added safer permeant climbing equipment to natural spaces and the enormous fallout from the community around this issue, and the seemingly contradictory values of access and safety in natural spaces. 
Location: United States
Listen to Alex's Audio Story: Bolt Wars

Questions? Contact SSP Managing Editor Laura Joyce Davis.

Listen to previous Braden grant projects  Get details about applying