Hannah Guan

High School Graduation Year: 2023
Year First Awarded the Carson Scholarship, School: 2021, BASIS San Antonio
Sponsored by: Mr. Eugene Badgett

At eleven years old, Hannah, a champion for equal opportunities for all students, built a community where everyone could have just that.  She put her concern for racial disparities in education into action and founded the first math organization in her community – San Antonio Math Include (SaMi).  SaMi provides greater access to STEM education to students from all cultures, social spheres or math experience levels.  Although shy at first about finding people to help support SaMi, Hannah eventually found her footing and recruited support from organizations including The Mathematical Association of America, The National Center for Women and Information Technology and MIT’s Math Prize for Girls.  She created partnerships with the United Nations Major Group of Children and Youth and the Global Youth Constituency for Quality Education and today, SaMi’s online math programs are accessible to 306,234 youth worldwide.  Because of Hannah’s work, in six years SaMi has grown to an international network connecting more than 42,000 students to educators in 910 schools across 42 states and 15 countries.  Hers is one of the first organizations that funded The First Internship program to offer the first paid, full-time internships and training for underprivileged youth to build career paths and goals.

Hannah’s love for numbers and fascination with math has now led her to Harvard College where she is working toward her bachelor’s degree in math, economics and computer science.  She is deeply committed to utilizing her knowledge and skills to tackle the most complex social and economic challenges, with a focus on promoting equality in the technology sector.  Currently, she is a project lead at Charles River Economics Lab where she leads analysts to conduct pro-bono economic policy research.  As an associate program director for Harvard WECode (Women Engineers Code), Hannah orchestrates the world’s largest student-run women in tech conference.  She is also the inaugural Aspirations in Computing Harvard Campus Representative through the National Center for Women and Information Technology, a role which allows her to advocate for the advancement of women in tech fields.  In 2022 Hannah was the grand prize winner of the International Science and Engineering Fair and in 2023 she was a Regeneron Science Talent Search Top 40 Finalist; titles that earned her recognition as one of the most promising young scientists worldwide.  In 2023, Hannah received the distinct honor of being the sole awardee of both the Coolidge Presidential Scholarship and the US Presidential Scholarship – a full-ride distinction bestowed upon only one of 3.7 million high school graduates across the country.  As a 2-time Carson Scholar, Hannah believes that “this next generation of innovators and leaders has the power to impact positive change.”