Mercer Times

Princeton University has announced that three of its seniors, Diya Kraybill, Issa Mudashiru, and James Zhang, have been selected as Schwarzman Scholars. These students will participate in a one-year master's degree program in global affairs at Tsinghua University in Beijing. The program is fully funded.

The trio from Princeton are among 150 scholars chosen from 38 countries and 105 universities worldwide. Stephen A. Schwarzman, the founding trustee of Schwarzman Scholars, remarked on the selection: “This year’s selected Scholars are keenly interested in learning about China and broadening their understanding of global affairs, which are both now more important than ever.”

The selection process for the Schwarzman Scholar Class of 2025-26 was highly competitive, with nearly 5,000 candidates applying globally. The chosen scholars will commence their studies in August.

Diya Kraybill hails from Singapore and has ties to Bangladesh and the U.S. She is majoring in politics with a certificate in history and diplomacy at Princeton. Her involvement includes serving as vice president of her class since her first year and being editor-in-chief of the Princeton Legal Journal. Kraybill aims to pursue a career in international law and plans to deepen her knowledge of Chinese political systems through this scholarship.

Issa Mudashiru is an anthropology major from Bethesda, Maryland, focusing on East Asian studies and global health policy. He co-captains the university's men's varsity soccer team and conducted ethnographic research in Sierra Leone last summer. Mudashiru aspires to work in orthopedic surgery while fostering collaborations between health officials across different regions.

James Zhang is studying computer science with minors in linguistics and statistics at Princeton. He served as president emeritus of the Princeton Entrepreneurship Club and focuses his senior thesis on digitizing historical documents using language models. Zhang intends to become an AI researcher-entrepreneur.

These scholars exemplify diverse academic interests and leadership qualities that align with the goals of the Schwarzman Scholars program.