UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Jenna Grzeslo, a doctoral student in Mass Communications at Penn State, has won the Graduate Student International Research Award. The purpose of the award is to promote and support international research and scholarship by graduate students that has potential for global impact.
A doctoral student in mass communications, Grzeslo is examining “how information and communication technologies ─ specifically mobile-enabled services ─ aid the development of an emerging entrepreneurship culture among youth in Nairobi, Kenya, all in the context of a developing society.”
Grzeslo noted that her dissertation research “seeks to identify the mechanisms that are spurring economic development in Kenya," and that an understanding of these mechanisms could “encourage economic development not only in Kenya, but also in other underdeveloped nations as well.”
In the words of the nominator, Grzeslo’s project “is likely to make significant contributions to both the theory of information and communication technologies-led development, and to a growing corpus of case study literature on entrepreneurship in developing economies.”
Grzeslo was honored during the annual Graduate Student Awards Luncheon held on April 18 at the Nittany Lion Inn.