Four from MIT named 2026 Rhodes Scholars

Vivian Chinoda '25, Alice Hall, Sofia Lara, and Sophia Wang '24 have been selected as 2026 Rhodes Scholars and will begin fully funded postgraduate studies at the University of Oxford in the U.K. next fall. Hall, Lara, and Wang, are U.S. Rhodes Scholars; Chinoda was awarded the Rhodes Zimbabwe Scholarship.

The scholars were supported by Associate Dean Kim Benard and the Distinguished Fellowships team in Career Advising and Professional Development. They received additional mentorship and guidance from the Presidential Committee on Distinguished Fellowships.

"MIT students never cease to amaze us with their creativity, vision, and dedication," says Professor Taylor Perron, who co-chairs the committee along with Professor Nancy Kanwisher. "This is especially true of this year's Rhodes scholars. It's remarkable how they are simultaneously so talented in their respective fields and so adept at communicating their goals to the world. I look forward to seeing how these outstanding young leaders shape the future. It's an honor to work with such talented students."

Vivian Chinoda '25

Vivian Chinoda, from Harare, Zimbabwe, was named a Rhodes Zimbabwe Scholar on Oct. 10. Chinoda graduated this spring with a BS in business analytics. At Oxford, she hopes to pursue the MSc in social data science and a master's degree in public policy. Chinoda aims to foster economic development and equitable resource access for Zimbabwean communities by promoting social innovation and evidence-based policy.

At MIT, Chinoda researched the impacts of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation on stakeholders and key indicators, such as innovation, with the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society. She supported the Digital Humanities Lab and MIT Ukraine in building a platform to connect and fundraise for exiled Ukrainian scientists. With the MIT Office of Sustainability, Chinoda co-led the plan for a campus transition to a fully electric vehicle fleet, advancing the Institute's Climate Action Plan.

Chinoda's professional experience includes roles as a data science and research intern at Adaviv (a controlled-environment agriculture startup) and a product manager at Red Hat, developing AI tools for open-source developers.

Beyond academics, Chinoda served as first-year outreach chair and vice president of the African Students' Association, where she co-founded the Impact Fund, raising over $30,000 to help members launch social impact initiatives in their countries. She was a scholar in the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing (SERC) program, studying big-data ethics across sectors like criminal justice and health care, and a PKG social impact internship participant. Chinoda also enjoys fashion design, which she channeled into reviving the MIT Black Theatre Guild, earning her the 2025 Laya and Jerome B. Wiesner Student Art Award.

Alice Hall

Alice Hall is a senior from Philadelphia studying chemical engineering with a minor in Spanish. At Oxford, she will earn a DPhil in engineering, focusing on scaling sustainable heating and cooling technologies. She is passionate about bridging technology, leadership, and community to address the climate crisis.

Hall's research journey began in the Lienhard Group, developing computational and techno-economic models of electrodialysis for nutrient reclamation from brackish groundwater. She then worked in the Langer Lab, investigating alveolar-capillary barrier function to enhance lung viability for transplantation. During a summer in Madrid, she collaborated with the European Space Agency to optimize surface treatments for satellite materials.

Hall's current research in the Olivetti Group, as part of the MIT Climate Project, examines the manufacturing scalability of early-stage clean energy solutions. Hall has gained industry experience through internships with Johnson and Johnson and Procter and Gamble.

Hall represents the student body as president of MIT's Undergraduate Association. She also serves on the Presidential Advisory Cabinet, the executive boards of the Chemical Engineering Undergraduate Student Advisory Board and MIT's chapter of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the Corporation Joint Advisory Committee, the Compton Lectures Advisory Committee, and the MIT Alumni Association Board of Directors as an invited guest.

She is an active member of the Gordon-MIT Engineering Leadership Program, the Black Students' Union, and the National Society of Black Engineers. As a member of the varsity basketball team, she earned both NEWMAC and D3hoops.com Region 2 Rookie of the Year honors in 2023.

Sofia Lara

Hailing from Los Angeles, Sofia Lara is a senior majoring in biological engineering with a minor in Spanish. As a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, she will pursue a DPhil in clinical medicine, leveraging UK biobank data to develop sex-stratified dosing protocols and safety guidelines for the NHS.

Lara aspires to transform biological complexity from medicine's blind spots into a therapeutic superpower where variability reveals hidden possibilities and precision medicine becomes truly precise.

At the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Lara investigates the cGAS-STING immune pathway in cancer. Her thesis, a comprehensive genome-wide association study illuminating the role of STING variation in disease pathology, aims to expand understanding of STING-linked immune disorders.

Lara co-founded the MIT-Harvard Future of Biology Conference, convening multidisciplinary researchers to interrogate vulnerabilities in cancer biology. As president of MIT Baker House, she steered community initiatives and executed the legendary Piano Drop, mobilizing hundreds of students in an enduring ritual of collective resilience. Lara captains the MIT Archery Team, serves as music director for MIT Catholic Community, and channels empathy through hand-stitched crocheted octopuses for pediatric patients at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

Sophia Wang '24

Sophia Wang, from Woodbridge, Connecticut, graduated with a BS in aerospace engineering and a concentration in the design of highly autonomous systems. At Oxford, she will pursue an MSc in mathematical and theoretical physics, followed by an MSc in global governance and diplomacy.

As an undergraduate, Wang conducted research with the MIT Space Telecommunications Astronomy Radiation (STAR) Lab and the MIT Media Lab's Tangible Media Group and Center for Bits and Atoms. She also interned at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, working on engineering projects for exoplanet detection missions, the Mars Sample Return mission, and terrestrial proofs-of-concept for self-assembly in space.

Since graduating from MIT, Wang has been engaged in a number of projects. In Bhutan, she contributes to national technology policy centered on mindful development. In Japan, she is a founding researcher at the Henkaku Center, where she is creating an international network of academic institutions. As a venture capitalist, she recently worked with commercial space stations on the effort to replace the International Space Station, which will decommission in 2030. Wang's creative prototyping tools, such as a modular electromechanical construction kit, are used worldwide through the Fab Foundation, a network of 2,500+ community digital fabrication labs.

An avid cook, Wang created with friends Mince, a pop-up restaurant that serves fine-dining meals to MIT students. Through MIT Global Teaching Labs, Wang taught STEM courses in Kazakhstan and Germany, and she taught digital fabrication and 3D printing workshops across the U.S. as a teacher and cyclist with MIT Spokes.