The Carolina Fellowship is a six-day-long intensive series of seminars that explore the foundational principles of the United States in the context of Western civilization.
Intended for recent graduates, graduate students, and young professionals from North America who have demonstrated leadership potential, its purpose is to ground future leaders in the ideals of responsible liberty at an early stage of their academic and professional development.
During the program, fellows will explore topics such as civic engagement, first principles of liberty, constitutionalism, the nature of human rights, economics, entrepreneurship, religion, architecture, art, leadership virtues, and more.
CSS is happy to announce the 2022 class of Carolina fellows:
Ms. Maria Bello is a Venezuelan-born conservative activist who has actively denounced Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro’s human rights violations. She fled her country at seventeen after experiencing democratic socialism’s destructive effects. In the United States, Maria has continued to be active in the fight against socialism and communism. She was the coalition director for Young Americans Against Socialism, has been featured in PragerU’s videos, and has now started a non-profit called ”America’s Momentum” that is dedicated to giving a voice to those who have lived through human rights violations.
Mr. Jacob Bruggeman received his B.A. and M.A. at Miami University and his M.Phil. at Cambridge University. He is currently a third-year Ph.D. student in history at Johns Hopkins University, where he studies political economy, technology, and intellectual history in the modern U.S. Jacob is the editor-in-chief of the Cleveland Review of Books.
Mr. Robert Cathcart is starting his third year at the University of South Carolina School of Law. He is a graduate of the University of South Carolina Honors College. He currently works at McCabe, Trotter, & Beverly in the field of community association law and is also a senior public affairs account manager at Heritage Brands. Robert is a member of the City of Cayce’s Elections Commission and Events Committee.
Ms. Margaret Clay is the editor and associate publisher for Columbia Metropolitan Magazine in Columbia, SC, her family’s business. She was Phi Beta Kappa at Wake Forest University, where she received a B.A. in English. She serves on the boards for the Central Carolina Community Foundation and Hammond School. Margaret owns a small art business, MGC Art, where she paints watercolor portraits.
Mr. Joao Paulo Cruz is a B.A. student born and raised in Rio de Janeiro. After completing his economics degree, he’ll be pursuing an M.A. at Università Luigi Bocconi in Milan. He is interested in philosophy, history, and literature, and hopes to found an education startup after graduate school.
Mrs. Sarah Anderson Curry graduated from Clemson with a B.A. in marketing and from the College of Charleston with an M.A. in communication. She’s spent the last thirteen years in marketing and communication roles in various industries, most recently in the “social good” technology space at Blackbaud. She is a graduate of the Leadership Hartsville Class of 2013 and was the South Carolina Public Relations Society’s Rookie of the Year in 2012.
Dr. Alex E. Hindman is an assistant professor of political science at the College of the Holy Cross, where he teaches courses in American ideas and institutions, focusing primarily on the U.S. Constitution. He earned a B.A. from Saint Vincent College and his M.A. and Ph.D. in American government and political philosophy from Claremont Graduate University. Additionally, he is the author of Gerald Ford and the Separation of Powers, arguing that the Constitution politically preserves presidents in perilous times.
Dr. Michael Hoffpauir is associate director of the Lyceum Program and clinical assistant professor of political science at Clemson University. He teaches courses in political philosophy, American politics, and statesmanship, and he is the author of Between Socrates and the Many: A Study of Plato’s Crito. He received a B.A. from Louisiana State University, an M.A. from Boston College, and a Ph.D. from Claremont Graduate University.
Mr. Thomas Hydrick is the assistant deputy solicitor general for the state of South Carolina. He previously worked as an associate attorney at Nelson, Mullins, Riley & Scarborough, LLP and also served as a law clerk to The Honorable A. Marvin Quattlebaum, Jr., Circuit Judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. He is a graduate of Vanderbilt University Law School, the University of Cambridge, and Furman University.
Dr. Joel Iliff is an assistant professor of history at Regent University, where he also teaches great books in the Honors College. He received a B.A. from the University of South Carolina before earning an M.A. from Yale and a Ph.D. from Baylor. His scholarship focuses on the religious origins of putatively secular phenomena, such as the modern university and antinatalism.
Mr. Baher Iskander is an incoming McCain Defense Fellow with the Department of Defense. He previously worked as a Senate staffer on the Armed Services Committee, a China analyst for a senior senator, and a Christian campus minister. Baher has a B.A. from Yale College and an M.A. from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs.
Mr. Deion A. Kathawa clerks for Justice Brian K. Zahra of the Michigan Supreme Court. He will next clerk for Judge William C. Griesbach of the United States District for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. He holds a B.A. in philosophy and political science from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor and a J.D. from the University of Notre Dame Law School. For two years, he served on the executive board of the Notre Dame Law School Federalist Society. As a second year law student, his essay, “Ambition Can Still Be Made to Counteract Ambition—Just Not in the Way Madison Envisioned,” won first place in the Federalist Society’s second annual Article I Initiative Writing Contest. Kathawa’s writing has been featured at RealClearPolitics, RealClearEducation, American Greatness, Public Discourse, The Josias, and others.
Mr. Alex Pack is a Washington, D.C. native and graduate of the College of Charleston, where he received a B.A. in English. He has worked for the Prague Security Studies Institute, the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, and the Cato Institute. He was an ISI Honors Scholar and worked on the 2020 documentary Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words.
Ms. Gwendolyn Rappuhn is a homeschool graduate and a fifth generation farmer from central North Dakota. For the past six years, she has been involved with the local Republican Party and has been elected as a delegate to the state convention four times. She serves as the Northeast chair of the North Dakota Young Republicans and has also has worked with local and statewide pro-life groups to bring in speakers who advocate for unborn children to her community.
Mr. Zachary Rogers is a graduate of Hillsdale College and the John Jay Institute Fellowship and is a member of the Steamboat Institute’s Emerging Leadership Council. He works as a program manager for a non-profit focused on higher education policy.
Mr. Austin Stone is the managing partner of Beck & Stone, a brand consultancy connecting America’s institutions to its culture, and Knight Takes Rook, a consultancy for disruptive engagement. Currently, he serves as interim C.O.O. of the Center for Urban Renewal and Education (CURE), an organization which works to heal distressed communities through conservative policy. He has been published in Newsweek, The American Spectator, Law & Liberty, The Federalist, American Greatness, and the Daily Caller.
Mrs. Anne Tew earned her B.A. in classics from the University of Virginia and her M.A. in theology from the University of Notre Dame. After several years of teaching Latin and English, Anne is now an editor and writer at Classical Academic Press, adjunct faculty at Regent University, and curriculum consultant in classical education with an emphasis on Latin.
Mr. Jonathan Valadez is a board member of several organizations in Greenville, SC and works with the Greenville Chamber of Commerce. During his time at Bob Jones University, he started and revitalized several organizations.
Ms. Nicole Williams is a graduate of Tulane University and the University of Glasgow. She has worked as a staffer in the U.K. Parliament, with the Richmond, VA city council, and as a staff member at Appalachian State University in North Carolina. Nicole is currently a second year history Ph.D. student at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland.