Plainfield North Grad Earns Fulbright Scholarship, To Study In Nepal

PLAINFIELD, IL — A 2016 Plainfield North High School graduate was recently recognized as one of four Duke University Ph.D candidates to be awarded a Fulbright Scholarship.

Rachael Lau was awarded the scholarship, which is handed out by the U.S. government’s flagship international educational exchange program. The scholarship program offers educational opportunities in more than 40 countries and is designed to facilitate cultural exchange and increase mutual understanding between people of the United States and those of other countries.

Lau graduated from Duke in 2020 with a degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering with a focus in water resources engineering and a Certificate in Global Development Engineering.

She is currently working a project through the scholarship program in Nepal on a research grant that focused on mitigating disaster by using technology for geophysical risk and resiliency.

Lau will conduct research in partnership with the National Society for Earthquake Technology-Nepal and the Institute of Engineering, Pulchowk, as part of a project to understand and model geohazard risk in Nepal and the greater Himalaya, according to a Duke University release. More specifically, she will be working on the use of remote sensing methods to monitor geohazards.

Lau co-founded and co-manages a research cohort on earthquake risk and resiliency between Duke and the Institute of Engineering in Kathmandu, Nepal and is an incoming researcher at the National Society for Earthquake Technology in Nepal. She currently serves as the President of the Southeast Region of Engineers Without Borders, USA.