Wells Wins 2026 AERA Fellowship
Tre Wells, a doctoral candidate in Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy, is one of seven graduate students nationwide to receive an AERA Minority Dissertation Fellowship in Education Research for 2025–26. He will also receive travel funding to present his research at the 2026 AERA annual meeting in Los Angeles.
Wells, who is pursuing a doctorate in human development and social policy, researches the influence of federal policy on historically Black colleges and universities and how attending one can shape a student’s racial identity. His latest project examines the influence of the federal Pell Grant program on local businesses in HBCU college towns.
He is the second doctoral student from the School of Education and Social Policy to win the fellowship, which supports scholars who have been historically underrepresented in faculty, research, and other scholarly positions in education research. He joins Abraham Lo (PhD17), now a senior science educator at BSCS Science Learning, who received the award in 2014.
The program awards fellows a $25,000 stipend to complete their dissertation research and training. Fellows also present their work during a poster session at the AERA annual meeting and meet with senior scholars through a mentoring and career development workshop.
Earlier this year, Wells was selected for the Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, which recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and excellence in doctoral education.
“Tre has become a true intellectual leader,” said his adviser, Jonathan Guryan, the Lawyer Taylor Professor of Education and Social Policy. “He’s among the most promising graduate students I’ve come across in my 15 years at Northwestern and a truly wonderful colleague who stimulates and supports everyone he’s around.”
In addition to his dissertation research, Wells is part of a graduate student-led team evaluating the city of Evanston’s Guaranteed Income Pilot Program. His role includes assessing how the financial support affects recipients and how key stakeholders envision the program’s transition from a pilot initiative to local policy.
Wells also serves as the graduate student lead for Black Men LEAD, an organization focused on mentoring and leadership development for Black students and staff at Northwestern and Evanston Township High School. He has organized the School of Education and Social Policy’s first-year Ph.D. student orientation, co-organized the Connections program, and helped coordinate the Applied Microeconomics Colloquium (Econ Lab).
Originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, Wells attended Little Rock Central High School, which decades earlier was the epicenter of a national struggle over school desegregation after the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision. He majored in mathematics at Morehouse College in Atlanta and earned a master’s degree in economics from the University of Virginia. He calls his decision to attend a historically Black college “one of the best” he’s ever made.
Before coming to Northwestern, Wells worked with nonprofit youth development programs in New York City. He was named Mentor of the Year by Big Brothers Big Sisters of New York City and also volunteered as a coach and tutor.