MIT master’s students Sunshine Jiang ’25 and Rupert Lee ’24 are this year’s recipients of the Knight-Hennessy Scholarship. Now in its ninth year, the highly competitive scholarship provides up to three years of financial assistance for graduate study at Stanford University.
Sunshine Jiang ’25
Sunshine Jiang, of Hangzhou, China, graduated from MIT in 2025 with a minor in mathematics and economics, as well as a double major in physics and electrical engineering and computer science. She will receive her Master of Engineering degree this month and will begin her PhD in computer science at the Stanford School of Engineering this fall.
Jiang researches embodied artificial intelligence and robotics, developing data-efficient, adaptive systems for general-purpose robots that broaden access. He has presented his research at major conferences, including the Conference on Robot Learning, the International Conference on Robotics and Automation, and the International Conference on Learning Representations.
Jiang led the development of AI-powered systems that provide access to traditional Chinese arts in rural classrooms, established cross-country programs that expand girls’ access to STEM education, and created a COVID-19 documentary amplifying community voices that was featured on China Daily.
Rupert Lee ’24
Rupert Lee of Portland, Oregon is currently pursuing a PhD in mathematics at Stanford’s School of Humanities and Sciences. He graduated from MIT in 2024 with a bachelor’s degree, double majoring in mathematics and computer science, economics, and data science. Along with his bachelor’s degree, he also obtained a master’s degree in Data Science. Lee then traveled to the United Kingdom as a Marshall Scholar, where he earned a master’s degree in mathematics from the University of Cambridge.
Lee’s research interests lie in probability, discrete geometry and combinatorics. He enjoys serving as a consultant for MIT PRIMES-USA, a high school mathematics research program, and previously served as a consultant for Duluth REU, an undergraduate mathematics research program. In addition to the Knight-Hennessy Scholarship and the Marshall Scholarship, he has been awarded the Hertz Fellowship, the PD Soros Fellowship, and the Goldwater Scholarship, and has received honorable mention for the Frank and Brainy Morgan Award.
