Two gifted legal scholars take up the annual Daniel M. Sachs Class of 1960 Graduating Scholarships at Oxford and Princeton.

Intended to broaden the global experience of its recipients, the Sachs Scholarship was established by classmates and friends of Daniel Sachs, a distinguished Princeton student athlete in the Class of 1960 who attended Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. Sachs died of cancer at age 28 in 1967. Each year, a Princeton senior and a Worcester student or recent graduate swap institutions, chosen for their exemplification of Sachs’ character, intelligence and commitment.

Farzana Salik

Farzana (2022, MSc) read Law at Newnham College, Cambridge before coming to Worcester, where she achieved a distinction for her Master’s in Criminology and Criminal Justice. Having completed the Bar course, she is on the path to becoming a Barrister while concurrently pursuing her Licence for Islamic Scholarship at Al-Salam Institute.

Salik is currently a policy adviser in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, where she develops strategic policies on AI capability with industry leaders. Inspired by her personal journey and advocacy for women’s rights, she founded Taahirah, a movement championing Muslim women’s health by combining faith and holistic health guidance.

As a Sachs Scholar, Farzana will spend next year as a visiting graduate student in Princeton’s School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), where she plans to research the ethical use of artificial intelligence to address reproductive health inequities. Her project, titled “Addressing the Gender Data Gap in Healthcare through AI,” will investigate how AI can improve healthcare outcomes and shape future technologies.

“Farzana is a brilliant and dedicated young woman,” said Dr Leila Ullrich, Worcester Fellow and Associate Professor of Criminology, citing her “dedication to legal practice, advocacy and reform,” her keen analytical skills, and her commitment to justice.

Noah James

Noah, of Amesbury, Massachusetts, is majoring in Princeton’s School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA) and minoring in Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies and history and the practice of diplomacy. He is currently a fellow at SPIA’s Center for International Security Studies (CISS) and the Princeton European Union Program.

He plans to earn two Master’s degrees while at Oxford, one in Criminology and Criminal Justice and one in Global Governance and Diplomacy. Noah also hopes to broaden his international scholarship by working with the Oxford Transitional Justice Research network and Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict, as well as the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights.

Noah has interned at the US Department of State’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, where he proposed transitional justice policies for the Haitian judicial system. He has also interned at the UN Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict and wrote a forthcoming report examining how juvenile justice frameworks can foster child soldier reintegration.

SPIA lecturer Carol Martin met Noah through her SPIA task force, Improving Democracy and Governance in Developing Countries, for which he received the R.W. Van de Velde award for outstanding junior independent work. “Noah continually astonishes me with the depth of his maturity in reflecting about the professional and personal resilience required for effecting meaningful, positive changes in global affairs,” she wrote in a letter of recommendation. “He is one of the best young professionals I have ever encountered, as a scholar and as a development practitioner.”

Outside of his academic work, he has volunteered with the Princeton Asylum Project and the Pace Center for Civic Engagement’s Service Focus program. He previously served as the executive director of the Coffee Club, Princeton’s student-run coffee shop.