Kellie Everett

 

Kellie Everett, 30, a 2022 graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, served six years in the U.S. Navy as a nuclear reactor operator, generating power for the 1,100-foot supercarrier U.S.S. George H. W. Bush at its home port in Virginia and on deployment in the Persian Gulf. Struggling in her transition from the armed services to academic life, with few peers knowledgeable about the military experience, she started a group chat for student veterans to ease that passage for others. Joined by vets from MIT’s graduate programs, faculty and staff, she co-founded MIT’s Student Veterans Association, leading the university administration to later create MIT’s first Office of Student Veteran Success. That office provides information about childcare, veteran-specific mental health support and other services. As an Eisenhower Global Scholar at the University of Oxford, Everett wants to learn how the United Kingdom dramatically reduced its reliance on fossil fuels and educate the public about the differences between nuclear reactors driven by fission and relatively safer fusion reactors. Her ambition is to become a U.S. senator and she will use her time at Oxford to study government systems. “I strive,” she said, “to become a servant-leader that deserves her constituents.”

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