2025-2026 aronson SCHOLARS
Grace Anderson
Writer, Imaginary, and World-Bender
Grace Anderson is a writer, imaginary, and world-bender curating at the intersection of queerness, resource mobilization, climate & environmental justice, and Black dignity & imagination. She approaches her work with curiosity, limitlessness, and an unflinching orientation toward abundance and collective liberation. She founded The Lupine Collaborative (TLC), a literary organization advancing environmental and climate justice by abundantly resourcing Black women, non-binary, and transgender people to dream, ideate, and build toward a liberatory future. She's currently getting her MFA in Creative Writing (Nonfiction) at the New School and is co-editing an anthology on Blackness, Queerness, and Nature to be published by Milkweed Editions.
Kyndal Coleman
E-Waste Steward, Creative, and Scholar-Activist
Kyndal is an e-waste steward, creative, and scholar-activist from Villa Rica, Georgia, whose work centers on cultivating regenerative and community-centered approaches to waste remediation. As an Environmental Policy and Sustainability Management master’s student and a Public Engagement Fellow, Kyndal focuses on fostering ecologically responsible and communally rooted solutions to waste remediation that challenge norms of overconsumption, confront extractive systems and reimagine our linear relationship to waste. Working in tandem with Antonia Simon as a 2025 Aronson Fellow, she's excited to develop solutions for slowing the tech life cycle by developing an accessible, community-driven model for tech repair and rental.
Sofya Krasnay
Urban Designer and Researcher
Sofya Krasnay is an urban designer and researcher specializing in ecological and climate-responsive planning for reindustrialized waterfronts. She is a Ph.D. candidate at The New School, where her work focuses on integrating Nature-Based Solutions into New York City’s reindustrialized estuary through a social-ecological-technological systems framework with a strong emphasis on environmental justice. Sofya is an Associate Landscape Architect at EDSA and a Senior Designer at Second Nature Ecology + Design, contributing to major international resilience and ecological design projects. Her practice bridges scientific research, urban policy, and design innovation, advancing strategies that restore ecosystems, modernize industrial zones, and support equitable, future-ready coastal cities.
Fernanda Rebelato
Brazilian Researcher and Practitioner
Fernanda Rebelato is a Brazilian researcher and practitioner focused on intersectional, gender-transformative approaches to women’s livelihoods and economic inclusion. She holds a degree in International Relations from the University of São Paulo and has over seven years of experience advancing inclusive development through work with international organizations.
Pursuing an MA in International Affairs at The New School, her research centers care as essential economic infrastructure and examines unpaid care labor policies in Latin America. With the Aronson Scholarship, she will focus on COP30’s aftermath and how global climate governance centers, or not, debates over care, climate, and women’s livelihoods.
Antonia Simon
Designer and Researcher
Antonia is a designer and researcher whose work seeks to rebalance the relationship between nature and technology within urban ecosystems. As a Design and Urban Ecologies master’s student and Social Impact Fellow, she focuses on community-based solutions that confront the extractive socio-ecological realities embedded in contemporary technologies to envision more just digital urban ecologies. As a 2025 Aronson Fellow alongside Kynal Coleman, she is developing Slow Circuits, a refurbished-technology rental and repair library designed that aims to cultivate collective access and digital resilience.
Ashli Marino Watson
Impact Entrepreneur and Industrial Designer
Ashli Marino Watson is an impact entrepreneur and industrial designer with a background in architecture and agriculture. Her project, Invasive Matters PBC, focuses on ecological restoration and regenerative design, transforming invasive plant biomass into non-toxic, regenerative building materials that benefit both nature and human health. Blending design, material innovation, and sustainable practices, Ashli develops projects that address environmental challenges while creating resilient, socially conscious outcomes. Her practice bridges art, design, and ecological innovation, aiming to reimagine how communities interact with and give back to the natural world.
Learn the stories of our 2022-2023 Aronson fellows
Dana Duarte Hernandez
Parsons, Strategic Design Management MS program, class of ‘23
Kier Blake
Schools of Public Engagement, Environmental Policy and Sustainability Management MS program, class of ‘23