20.06.2024

Gabe Orona awarded with prestigious AVDF/ACLS Fellowship for Research on the Liberal Arts

$45,000 to investigate the impact of liberal arts experiences on well-being and civic engagement

Gabe Orona, postdoctoral researcher at the Hector Research Institute of Education Sciences and Psychology and member of the LEAD Graduate School and Research Network, has received one of four AVDF/ACLS Fellowships for his project "Examining the Impact of Public Liberal Arts Education on Cultivating Civic and Democratic Citizenship: Causes and Results." The fellowship, which was made possible by a grant from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations (AVDF), is endowed with $45,000 and will provide funding and training for scholarly research utilizing the extensive College and Beyond II (CBII) database to examine how experiencing a liberal arts education has shaped students at different stages and in various aspects of their lives and careers. The fellowships were awarded after a rigorous, interdisciplinary peer review process and are therefore a testament to the excellence of the selected projects.  

The ACLS is a nonprofit federation of 81 scholarly organizations. As the leading representative of American scholarship in the humanities and interpretive social sciences, ACLS upholds the core principle that knowledge is a public good. In supporting its member organizations, ACLS utilizes its endowment and $37 million annual operating budget to expand the forms, content, and flow of scholarly knowledge. 

The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations were established in 1952 based on the estate of entrepreneur Arthur Vining Davis. They are intended to honor and perpetuate his ambitious philanthropic vision. Since their inception, the foundations have awarded over 4,600 grants totaling more than $385 million to colleges, universities, hospitals and medical schools, among others.