Category: Alumni

GWSS and CHEM alum Michael McClellan ’13 was featured by the MIT Technology Review in a story titled, “Data on the Baseball Diamond.” McClellan earned his PhD from MIT in 2018.

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 has won three Minnesota Book Awards in the categories of memoir, children’s literature, and middle grade literature. She is the first person to ever win a trio of prizes at one Minnesota Book Awards ceremony.

GWSS and AMST alum Esmé Schwall ’97 has earned a 2025 Christopher Award for her book The Ballerina of Auschwitz, co-authored with La Jolla-based author and Holocaust survivor Dr. Edith Eva Eger. The book for young adults is one of 12 winners for adults and young people as the Christopher Awards program marks its 76th year.

The Christopher Awards celebrate authors, illustrators, writers, producers and directors, whose work “affirms the highest values of the human spirit” and reflect the Christopher motto, “It’s better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.”

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 was named Artist of the Year by The Minnesota Star Tribune for 2024. In the piece announcing her achievement, Yang mentions the honorary degree she received from Carleton during the Class of 2024 Commencement ceremony.

Read the full piece in the Star Tribune.

GWSS alum and Minneapolis City Council member Robin Wonsley ’13 has been announced as the keynote speaker for this year’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Celebration, hosted by the Northfield Human Rights Commission. The theme of this year’s event is “Mission Possible: Protecting Freedom, Justice, and Democracy in the Spirit of Nonviolence 365.”

Read the full announcement on KYMN.

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 was featured in a Star Tribune piece titled “Four Minnesota writers each have 3 (or more!) books out this year. How did they do it?”

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 was featured in the Carleton News for her class of 2024 commencement address. Yang is a Hmong writer who holds the distinction of authoring both the first Hmong American memoir published with national distribution about the history of Hmong people and the first Hmong story adapted to opera. An honorary doctoral degree was conferred to her during the ceremony, and she gave an inspiring and heartfelt address about the power and history of her family, herself, and the Hmong people.

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 was featured in The New York Times for her newly released memoir “Where Rivers Part.” The piece is titled, “Memoirs Are Powerful Currency for This Hmong American Writer.”

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 will give the commencement address for Carleton College’s 150th Commencement. Yang is a Hmong writer who holds the distinction of authoring both the first Hmong American memoir published with national distribution about the history of Hmong people and the first Hmong story adapted to opera.

GWSS, AMST, and CCST alum Kao Kalia Yang ’03 published a piece in Condé Nast Traveler titled, “In a World Where There Is No Hmongland, There Is St. Paul’s Hmong Village.” The piece is part of a series called Home, Made, “a collection of stories honoring Asian diasporas creating vibrant communities by weaving their heritages with their American hometowns.”