Grace Perkins

Grace graduated with a degree in International Relations and French and Francophone Studies. Originally from rural Virginia, she spent her time at W&M learning as much about the rest of the world as she could. While studying abroad in Cameroon, Grace completed a research project on Cameroonian perceptions of U.S. and Chinese foreign aid projects. She spent the following semester in Paris interning for a Tibetan cultural association. Grace returned to W&M to work for AidData, a research and innovation lab that provides easily accessible, transparent, and comprehensive information on foreign aid allocations. With AidData, she helped track Chinese foreign aid flows to Africa. Grace also spent her senior year as a research fellow with the Project on International Peace and Security, an on-campus think tank, and proposed leveraging GIS technology to study the potential relationship between foreign aid and security conditions. Grace spent her summers as a camp counselor sharing her love for marine science and sailing. She is looking forward to learning new languages and becoming more knowledgeable about all things shea-related in Ghana.