Current Scoville Fellows

Matthew Buongiorno is a Fall 2009 Scoville Fellow with the Federation of American Scientists where he focuses on small arms and light weapons, Stockpile Stewardship and nuclear warhead Life Extension Programs, and Iran’s procurement network. He graduated first in his class from Texas Christian University in 2009 with a BA in Political Science and a minor in Economics. He participated in and served as Head Delegate for Model United Nations throughout college, attending conferences in Washington DC, New York, and China, and earning several Outstanding Delegation awards. Now that he has graduated college he serves as a member of staff for National Model United Nations in addition to his work at FAS. During college he was a representative in Student Government, wrote for the university paper, competed and went to nationals in moot court, and volunteered for World Relief, where he taught English to recently immigrated refugee families. He is from Dallas, Texas.

Mark Donaldson is a Spring 2010 Scoville Fellow at the Union of Concerned Scientists focusing on START, warhead modernization, and the defense budget. He graduated from Amherst College in 2009 with a BA in Political Science. He was a state winner of the 2005 U.S. Institute of Peace essay contest with an essay entitled “Democratization in Poland and Pakistan.” He was the editor in chief for The Indicator, a journal of political and social thought and news editor for The Amherst Student, the weekly student newspaper. He was involved with the Amherst College Center for Community Engagement and volunteered as a door-to-door political campaigner for the Brad Carson for U.S. Senate. He is from Tulsa, OK.

Meg McDermott is a Spring 2010 Scoville Fellow at Citizens for Global Solutions, where she focuses on arms control and disarmament, genocide prevention, and the international criminal court. Previously she was a project assistant for the Carter Center's Access to Information Project, where she worked in various capacities since August of 2007. Meg has worked on international conferences on the right to information in Atlanta, Lima, and Accra. In 2009, she completed a Masters in international security studies at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, as a Robert T. Jones Jr. scholar and interned at the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence. Meg graduated with highest honors from Emory University in 2008 with a degree in international studies. At Emory, she researched transparency laws in Latin America for her honors thesis and served as managing editor of The Emory Wheel and co-editor in chief of the Emory Political Review. She is from Houston, Texas.

Lisa Putkey is a Fall 2009 Scoville Fellow at Peace Action Education Fund where she is focusing on nuclear disarmament issues, including the NPT, and on mobilizing youth activism on these issues. She received a BA in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of California at Berkeley in May 2008. She spent a summer during college studying Spanish in Madrid. At Berkeley she was chair of Fiat Pax, where she collaborated with progressive student groups to build a multi-campus movement to demilitarize the University of California with a focus on ending management of the National Laboratories. She was an intern at the Western States Legal Foundation in Oakland and collaborated with Abolition 2000 at the 2005 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Conference at the UN and wrote an analysis article for Reaching Critical Will. She was the director of Cal in the Capital, Cal Corps Public Service Center where she helped 85 Berkeley students to secure DC internships, and interned for Congressman Dennis Kucinich in his DC office. She served as a Senator in the Associated Students of the University of California, Berkeley. She is from California.

Mary Slosson is a Spring 2010 Scoville Fellow working at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, where she is focusing on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran, as well as nuclear security issues. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Foreign Affairs and French from the University of Virginia in 2008, where she was an Echols Scholar. She also studied French and Moroccan civilization at Institut Supérior des Etudes en Communication in Morocco. She worked as a United Nations correspondent for MediaGlobal, writing on issues of economic development, global health, food security and the impact of climate change on developing countries. She was an assistant with the Presidential Oral History Program at the Miller Center of Public Affairs where she communicated with senatorial and presidential staff and researched recent presidencies. She has done field work on international non-governmental organizations in Senegal and volunteered in education and development in Uganda. She is from Charlottesville, VA.

Michael Tu is a Spring 2010 Scoville Fellow working at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies focusing on chemical and biological weapons proliferation, dual use technologies, and export controls. He earned a BA in history and a BS in engineering from Swarthmore College in 2005 and an MS in bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 2008. He was a Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the National Academy of Sciences, where he supported the Committee on Scientific Communication and National Security and performed research for the report “Beyond ‘Fortress America:’ Strengthening National Security in a Globalized World.” He worked as an electrical engineer at Raytheon Missile Systems in Tucson, AZ, where he was responsible for ensuring performance of electro-optical sensor components of Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle, the intercept component of ground-based ballistic missile interceptor. He was a research intern at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia where he focused on China and Taiwan. He is from San Jose, CA.