Holy Cross Senior Receives Highly-Competitive Fellowship

WORCESTER, Mass. – Justin Parrella ’06, a senior from Lexington, Mass., is one of only 1,000 students nationwide to receive the prestigious Graduate Research Fellowship from the National Science Foundation. The fellowship provides three years of support for graduate study leading to research-based master’s or doctoral degrees, and is intended for students who are at the early stages of their graduate study.

Parrella, a chemistry and physics major who received a Goldwater Scholarship last year as a junior, will enter Harvard University’s Division of Engineering and Applied Science and work toward a PhD. He will study with Daniel J. Jacob, a prominent researcher who is well-known for his work for his research on the chemistry of the troposphere and how anthropogenic emissions affect regional air quality in addition to implications for global climate change. Parrella’s work will involve global modeling of atmospheric chemistry and climate, aircraft measurement campaigns, satellite data retrievals, and analyses of atmospheric observations.

At Holy Cross, Parrella has combined his lab and research work with a deep interest in educational outreach and teaching. He was one of the founding members of the Student Alliance for Advancement of Alternative Fuels and Energy (SAAAFE), and has spent the last two years working with sixth-graders at the Nativity School of Worcester. In addition to teaching the young students about environment, and with funding from a Marshall Grant, he has helped them build solar cars and introduced them to books like Fifty Things Kids Can Do to Save the Environment.

He has also been involved in peer tutoring and in the "Hogwarts at Holy Cross" program, where he helped construct a solar panel display and demonstrate science experiments for Worcester schoolchildren.

Parrella entered Holy Cross with a broad range of interests, and was not certain what he would focus on academically until he began taking advanced chemistry courses. "One thing that stood out for me and made my experience at Holy Cross very special," he said, "is how professors have always been available to help me chisel out what it is I want to do, and how I can get there."

He plans to continue his combined interests at Harvard, looking forward to finding teaching assistantships and educational outreach opportunities along with his research responsibilities.

The National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program has a stated aim "to ensure the vitality of the human resource base of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in the United States, by investing in graduate education for a cadre of diverse individuals who demonstrate their potential to successfully complete graduate degree programs in disciplines relevant to the mission of the NSF."