ABOUT THE MILLENNIUM FELLOWSHIP - CLASS OF 2025
United Nations Academic Impact and MCN are proud to partner on the Millennium Fellowship. This year, 60,000+ young leaders applied to join the Class of 2025 on 7,000+ campuses across 170 nations. 290+ campuses worldwide (less than 5%) were selected to host the 4,500+ Millennium Fellows.
UNITED NATIONS ACADEMIC IMPACT AND MCN PROUDLY PRESENT SYDNEY CATHERINE DEVER-MENDENHALL, A MILLENNIUM FELLOW FOR THE CLASS OF 2025.
Stanford University | California, United States | Advancing SDG 11, SDG 3 & UNAI 6
" Many of the challenges addressed by the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals–especially those related to climate change and sustainability–simply cannot wait. It is essential that the world set ambitious targets and take immediate action to achieve them. I am excited to be a part of the forward-moving current towards a society that can continue to advance but does not need to deplete natural resources or damage human and animal health in the name of progress. "
Millennium Fellowship Project: Keeping The Bay Area Cool
I focused on Sustainable Development Goal 11, Sustainable Cities and Communities. I coordinated with San Mateo County, California to map heat vulnerability in Menlo Park and East Palo Alto, two cities near Stanford University. This project follows work I have previously done with the City of Palo Alto to offer advice for their 2026-2027 Sustainability Climate Action Plan to mitigate extreme heat and encourage urban resilience. In my project, I will use data collected by the Bay Area community and use it to create informative maps that detail the hottest and most vulnerable areas, taking into account variables such as age, income, and physical infrastructure. Our findings here will help to guide future policy and infrastructure improvements.
About the Millennium Fellow
Sydney Dever-Mendenhall is a junior at Stanford University researching sustainability through her Symbolic Systems and Urban Studies majors. Sustainability is an emerging field that spans all sectors and disciplines, and she advocates for an interdisciplinary approach to solving climate issues. Sydney considers the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to be an essential step towards a more sustainable future. She has previously conducted research at Georgetown University on urban resilience in response to extreme heat, and conducted research at MIT on the role of urban ecological corridors in increasing biodiversity. Outside of her academic pursuits, Sydney uses photography to document urban street scenes around the world.
