Our Scholars

Marty Stone Scholars

Marty Stone, founder of Stones' Phones, has supported Promise Scholar Success since 2018! Marty is a UCSB alum who pursued a career in campaigns and politics. Marty completed five election cycles at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and served as the finance director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. He has also served as Vice President for Governmental Relations for AGRISystems, a firm dedicated to reducing soil erosion and chemical inputs in farming.

Marty Stone and his scholars!

Marty Stone at dinner with students and staff

Scholars Spotlight

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Scholars

Nikolina Mancinelli

Earth Science Major

Nikolina participated in Cores to Code, an exciting geology program affiliated with Crescent and the University of Oregon. They learned how to analyze seismological data, study past earthquakes, and forecast the next “big one.” The work took place in Arcata, home to California’s most dangerous tectonic plate boundaries. There, Nikolina collected sediment samples from the marsh and analyzed them for microfossils and soil changes, then used Python to model the impacts of the region’s last major earthquake in the 1700s.

Huy Nguyen

Electrical Engineering major

Huy spent their summer interning at Amazon in Seattle, Washington!

Melva Castellanos

Sociology major

Melva travelled to Oaxaca, Mexico, to conduct field work, which included leading interviews and focus groups in nine different municipios, or small communities. Their research focused on Indigenous women's representation and participation in customary law and Mexico's legal system. Melva presented preliminary findings at the UCLA National McNair Conference.