UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Penn State Schreyer Scholar and Paterno Fellow Nakul Grover, a senior dual majoring in chemical engineering and English in the integrated Bachelor of Arts + Master of Arts program, recently received the 2020 Ardeth and Norman Frisbey International Student Award for undergraduates. 

The award, given by Penn State Global, recognizes undergraduate students who have contributed significantly to furthering international understanding. The student’s contributions could consist of academic, athletic or extracurricular campus activity and/or community involvement in school or civic group programs or service projects.

Grover earned the award for the work that led to “The Goddess of Peacocks,” a book of short stories about the plight of the migrants living in camps. Grover previously received an Erickson Discovery Grant to pursue his work, which began in 2018. The thesis also earned him the Center of Global Studies Thesis Prize.

A nominator for the Frisbey award praised Grover’s book with: “Grover constructed a brilliant collection of short stories, each of which takes up a different character’s narrative thread. He developed this thesis further — by more than a hundred pages — for his master’s thesis. He struck at the heart of characters, giving each a role to play: the exploiter, the ignorer, and the one who is desperate, the one defeated. How better to understand the crisis of a people than to delve into their most intimate aspirations?”

Grover was also nominated for his three-year commitment to the Presidential Leadership Academy, which is designed to give undergraduate students the leadership fundamentals needed to thrive in an environment in which multiple dimensions of an issue are explored, diverse viewpoints are welcomed and heard and a fully informed and respectful discourse ensues that leads to sound action.