Student activist and SESP senior Kaylyn Ahn was announced on Monday as one of the 36 winners of the 2025 Marshall Scholarships, according to a British consulate news release.
In memory of the former U.S. Secretary of State General George C. Marshall, the program annually draws hundreds of applicants from universities across the U.S. The year’s class winners will be allowed to pursue fully-funded graduate degrees up to three years at any university in the United Kingdom.
The Downers Grove native received a call from an unidentifiable phone number in November during a meeting with Northwestern’s Undergraduate Prison Education Partnership informing her that she had been named a Marshall Scholar. UPEP has been a familiar stomping ground for her, where she has spent hours designing tutoring programs for incarcerated people and programming to raise awareness about mass incarceration in the state.
Without thinking much, she stepped out of the UPEP meeting.
“I just took it because it was an unidentifiable number,” Ahn recalled amusingly.
Set to graduate this June, Ahn says she now plans to use the opportunity to study public policy at the University of Oxford in England afterward.
Her time at NU has been largely shaped by her advocacy work, arising from her own experiences.
Ahn has been open about her experience with sexual assault and fighting for justice for sexual assault survivors. After her own sexual assault case was dismissed three years ago by local law enforcement due to a legal loophole in the state legislature, she drafted and helped pass a 2022 bill to amend Illinois’ sexual assault law.
Police departments across the state have since been mobilized. All officers are now required to be undergo training on the bill’s enforcement, while thousands of previously unresolved sexual assault cases have been reclassified for prosecution.
“I think when you come to an elite institution like Northwestern with a lot of experiences, especially as a survivor of domestic and sexual violence, there’s this propensity to think that for people who do not understand, to define you as someone that you’re not,” Ahn said. “But I realized in a lot of ways, it empowered me and it showed me … I was also resilient.”
The following year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker appointed Ahn to the Illinois Council on Women and Girls to advise the governor on relevant policy issues affecting women and girls in the state.
She also previously worked for Rina Amiri — the U.S. special envoy for Afghan women, girls and human rights — to research gender-based violence and inequality. And in 2021, she earned recognition as one of GLAAD’s 20 Under 20 LGBTQ+ changemakers as a high school student.
“I think my advocacy work for survivors of gender-based violence is the reason why I want to go into public policy,” said Ahn, whose dream is to one day work in the International Criminal Court for the Office of the Prosecutor.
Her efforts have already taken her around the country to speak at dozens of colleges and political events to share her story.
Earlier in April, Ahn, along with Weinberg senior Anna Dellit, received the 2024 Truman Scholarship, which she said will help her pursue a law degree.
Ahn said it was only through her journey leading up to her time at NU that allowed her to realize a hidden truth.
“Don’t be ashamed of where you’re coming from or what you’ve been through, but be proud of the fact that you were able to overcome that and that you deserve a spot on this campus,” Ahn said.
Related Stories:
— Q&A: Student activist Kaylyn Ahn talks advocating for sexual assault survivors
— Ahn: On being a homeless student at a Top 10 university
— Voices for change: A non-comprehensive guide to NU’s activist landscape
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