Brandon K. Baker, Penn Today
At an annual reception for the 2025 winners of the President’s Innovation, Engagement, and Sustainability Prizes, held in early May, Prize winners, their families and mentors, and senior leadership gathered to celebrate the soon-to-be-graduates and their contributions toward addressing great challenges of our time.
The winners of the prizes receive $100,000 for their project and $50,000 each for a living stipend; they are also paired with a faculty mentor. The prizes are awarded annually.
Penn President J. Larry Jameson expressed that the event is one he looks forward to every year, calling the reception a “a fantastic opportunity to celebrate the best of Penn.”
“Really, the best of Penn in the framework of our founder, using creativity and innovation to engage with our community broadly for social good,” he said, going on to describe the many and varied accomplishments of Benjamin Franklin. “The group here, the winners of the President’s Engagement, Innovation, and Sustainability Prize, are very much in that model.”
Jameson continued to thank the winners’ families, some of whom were in attendance, for their continued support, and participants in the selection process.
“I’m superbly proud,” says Iffath Sharif, mother of Inaya Zaman, a PEP winner for Nourish to Flourish. She expressed excitement that the Nourish to Flourish project is focused on adopting principles from behavioral economics to implement school-based nutrition programs in West Philadelphia. Sharif also works in her professional life to support nutrition in underserved communities.
“It must be in the DNA!” she quipped.
Imani Nkrumah Ardayfio, another winner from Nourish to Flourish, says the team is looking to the future and “trying to ground this project” by reaching out to more community partners and planning to implement their program as soon as possible.
“This summer we’re really focused on planning and meeting our partners, and making sure everything is really settled for the fall,” Ardayfio said.
Piotr Lazarek, who won a President’s Sustainability Prize for Nirby, a farmland-management system that will address inefficiencies in fertilizer usage, described how incredible it has felt to be recognized as a winner of the Prize. He’s intentionally worked toward the goal since his first year on campus, he said.
“It’s surreal, and also it feels like a closure for this extremely fascinating and incredible journey I’ve been part of for four years,” Lazarek said.