Yale Divinity School Students Chosen for FASPE Ethics Fellowship
Spencer Beckman and Jake Villanova Join Groundbreaking Ethics Program for Graduate Students and Early-Career Professionals
New York, NY — Spencer Beckman, a student at Yale Divinity School, and Jake Villanova, a rising fourth-year M.D./M.A.R.-Ethics student at Yale School of Medicine and Yale Divinity School, have each been selected as one of 14 fellows for the 2026 programs of the Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics (FASPE), in the Clergy and Medical cohorts respectively.
Now in its sixteenth year, FASPE annually grants 80-90 Fellowships to graduate students and early-career professionals in the fields of Business, Clergy, Design & Technology, Journalism, Law, and Medicine. Fellows participate in a two-week program in Germany and Poland, which uses the conduct of professionals in Nazi-occupied Europe as an initial framework for approaching ethical responsibility in the professions today.
The FASPE curriculum takes advantage of the power of place with daily seminars and dialogue at sites of historic importance, often specific to each profession. The experience of the Clergy Fellows is enhanced by traveling alongside the Journalism and Medical Fellows, who—in formal and informal settings—consider together how ethical constructs and norms in their respective professions align and differ.
“We are living in a fraught moment when professionals face crucial ethical choices that in some instances are reminiscent of choices professionals faced in Nazi Germany. FASPE’s emphasis on examining why so many professionals made poor choices, how we might identify with their decision-making, and the horrific consequences of their choices helps to instill in professionals a rigorous and reflective approach that is valuable at any time, but particularly in a perilous moment like this one,” said Noah Bookbinder, FASPE’s CEO.
The 2026 Fellowship will take place in Germany and Poland over the course of two weeks this summer. The Clergy Program will be led by Rabbi Amy Wallk of Temple Beth El, and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, assistant director for partnerships and fellowships and lecturer at the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School. The Medical Program will be led by Robert Truog, MD, MA, Frances Glessner Lee Distinguished Professor of Medical Ethics, Anesthesia, and Pediatrics, Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, at Harvard Medical School, and Marianne M. Green, MD, vice dean for education at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine.
Spencer Beckman works at the intersection of faith and healthcare. He serves as student body president at Yale Divinity School while pursuing his Master of Divinity. Previously, Spencer was a nonprofit and public health leader in Memphis, TN, where he earned his B.A. from Rhodes College and M.B.A. in healthcare management from the University of Memphis. He has worked with hospitals, community health centers, local governments, foundations, and federal policymakers to encourage and equip people of faith and healthcare professionals as they strive to love their neighbors and to build healthier communities through innovative, mission-driven partnerships.
Thinking ahead to the upcoming fellowship trip, Beckman shared, “Living in Memphis—a city grappling with deep inequities—I began to appreciate the impact of professional power on the everyday lives of my neighbors, especially when this power leveraged or invoked religion. Believing the world needs public theologians who can navigate political and religious divides, I see FASPE’s programming as offering a formative space to practice engaging moral ambiguity and injustice with an eye toward real-world application—a needed training ground. Knowing that FASPE offers a compelling, reflective space to grow in my capacity as a nontraditional religious leader, I trust that my participation in this program will prepare me to faithfully and thoughtfully engage a world that deserves justice.”
Jake Villanova is a rising fourth-year M.D./M.A.R.-Ethics student at Yale School of Medicine and Yale Divinity School. He did his undergraduate studies at Iona College (B.S., chemistry) as well as graduate studies at Liberty University (M.A., Christian apologetics) and Brown University (Ph.D./M.S., chemistry/biomedical engineering). His Ph.D. research involved designing magnetic nanomaterials for applications in medicine, particularly as MRI contrast agents. He co-founded Yale's chapter of the Hippocratic Society, has led Yale's Health Professional Christian Fellowship, and is part of the M.D. program's biomedical ethics concentration.
Thinking ahead to the upcoming fellowship trip, Villanova shared, “When I heard of FASPE through our medical school's curriculum, I found I really resonated with its historically grounded and experiential approach to ethics education. It is an unfortunate reality that we often need concrete historical examples of medical malpractice and dereliction of duty to help us examine the ways we are similarly susceptible to it. But there is also something important about being physically present at the site of these abuses/failures that, I think, could help take what might otherwise be an inert theoretical knowledge and turn it into deep, practical wisdom that could be more readily applied in one’s profession. That–along with the opportunity for inter-professional discourse which could help reveal unexamined profession-specific ethical biases – is something an aspiring physician-bioethicist like myself could probably only gain from a program like FASPE.”
Beckman and Villanova join a diverse group of 84 FASPE Fellows across all six programs who were chosen through a competitive process that drew over 1,400 applicants from across the U.S. and the world. FASPE covers all program costs, including travel, food and lodging.
FASPE Fellows become members of a community of nearly 1,000 alumni. Through an annual reunion conference, leadership-development workshops, ethics symposia hosted in partnership with major academic and industry institutions, continued trips to ethically significant historical sites, and alumni writing, including in the Auschwitz Memorial and Museum’s Memoria Magazine, FASPE maintains long-term relationships with its Fellows in order to sustain a commitment to ethical behavior and to provide a forum for continued dialogue. Through FASPE’s Ethical Tensions Conversations, for example, alumni reflect upon and discuss the vital professional ethical issues of our own day in the spirit of open inquiry.
To learn more about FASPE and its programs, visit www.faspe-ethics.org.
###
About Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics (FASPE)
FASPE is a non-profit organization whose mission is to promote ethical leadership and responsibility among professionals beginning with recognition of the influence that professionals have on all aspects of society. Its distinctive methodology examines the behavior and motivations of the professionals who enabled and enacted Nazi policies to establish the importance and urgency of self-awareness, professionalism, and ethical leadership today.
Media Contact
Haley Gorda, Communications Manager
hgorda@faspe-ethics.org