First picture is Nancy Nguyen, Peace Fellow.  The second picture from left to right: Coronado Rotary President Rob Taylor, President-Elect LuAnn Miller, Rotary Fellow Nancy Nguyen; Peace Projects Co-Chair Sharon Raffer; and District 5340 Governor and Coronado Rotarian Dan Gensler.
 
The Rotary Club of Coronado celebrated with pride the announcement from Rotary International that Nancy Nguyen has been selected as a Rotary Peace Fellow. She will be attending the University of Queensland in Australia for the Masters of Peace and Conflict Studies, an 18-month fully funded program.
 
The conflict in Ukraine highlights the need for motivated individuals applying their energy and expertise to the achievement of worldwide peace.
 
“This is a real honor for us as a club and as a district,” said Rotary 5340 District Governor Dan Gensler. The district includes 61 Rotary Clubs consisting of 2,790 members in San Diego and Imperial Counties. 
 
The Rotary Peace Fellowship is designed for leaders with work experience in peace and development. Rotary Fellows are committed to community and international service and the pursuit of peace. Each year, The Rotary Foundation awards up to 50 fellowships for master’s degrees and 80 for certificate studies at premier universities.
 
Many Rotary Fellows go on to careers with governments, the military, law enforcement, NGOs, and international organizations like the United Nations and the World Bank. 
 
The work of actively building peace and understanding has been a hallmark of Rotary since its earliest days. With the creation in 1999 of the Rotary Peace Centers.
 
Last year Nancy contacted Coronado Rotary and connected with Past President Tami Sandke through an email for a Rotary Fellowship application endorsement and possible club sponsorship.  This was followed by further connections made with Peace Projects Committee co-chair Sharon Raffer, Coronado Rotary President-Elect LuAnn Miller, and President Rob Taylor. 
 
Through phone and in-person conversations, Nancy demonstrated her excellent communication skills and her engaging personality. Her background includes wide-reaching international, national, and local experiences including creating programs and policies focusing on refugees, youth, and community peacebuilding.  Endeavors like the above are strongly connected to Rotary’s “service above self” advocacy in advancing human rights and promoting peace and good will.  
 
The combination of Nancy’s academic and on-the-ground experiences, plus her passion and ideas for the future, give her a strong foundation for the challenges that lie ahead in a career as a peacemaker. Coronado Rotary became Nancy’s club sponsor and recommended that she connect and be interviewed by District 5340 representatives and send her application forward to Rotary International.
 
Nancy was chosen from a pool of global candidates for this highly competitive program.  Her present role is as a Civic Engagement Community Organizer at the Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans (PANA) in San Diego. As the most active resettlement region in California and a border city to the world’s largest binational region, Nancy’s work at PANA allows her to be on the front lines of refugee advocacy. For her work “fostering relationships with coalitions and organizations that work on advancing immigrant and refugee issues locally and statewide” she was recognized as a 2021 Women of Distinction in Youth Empowerment by the San Diego Mayor’s Office. Nancy is a 2019 graduate of San Diego State University, Honors College.
 
This story is an extract from an article appearing in the Coronado Magazine.