From Budapest to Brookings: How Clements Center Fellow Emily Nejad Prepared for a Career in National Security

Emily Nejad came to UT Austin planning to study government and history. By the time she graduated this spring, she had also added a minor in International Business, a certificate in Security Studies, and a resume that stretched from the Texas State Capitol to the Brookings Institution.

Nejad was a senior Undergraduate Fellow at the Clements Center, where she attended events and engaged with scholars and practitioners across the national security field. She also participated in the Strauss Center’s Cyber Clinic and completed the Texas Intelligence Academy. Outside the classroom, she served as president of TEDxUTAustin and was involved with the World Economic Forum’s Austin Hub of Global Shapers.

Her time at UT took her well beyond Austin. She spent a summer studying European politics and security in Hungary and traveled across Eastern Europe and South America—experiences she credited, in part, to the perspective she developed through the Clements Center. As a Spring 2025 Archer Fellow, she interned full time at the Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology at the Brookings Institution, one of Washington’s most prominent foreign policy research organizations. Earlier in her undergraduate career she also interned at the Office of State Senator César Blanco and the Civil Rights Division of the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office.

“The Clements Center’s programming gave me the skills and knowledge I needed to actually function in a policy environment,” she said. “It wasn’t just theoretical—the events, the conversations, the exposure to people working in the field made a real difference.”

Nejad plans to pursue a career in policy.