South Dakota locals named as 2024 Bush Fellows

RAPID CITY, S.D. (KEVN) – Last week, the Bush Foundation announced the 2024 Bush Fellows in the upper Midwest region and South Dakota has a few of its own.

Iraq war Veteran Amber Zora of Rapid City is an artist who has been curating veteran art exhibitions across the U.S. Her fellowship application was centered around Veteran Arts.

Also from Rapid City, Lily Mendoza was named a 2024 Bush Fellow for her work with the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women movement and the Red Ribbon Skirt Society.

David O’Hara of Sioux Falls is an environmental studies professor at Augustana University and has spent more than ten years working with a variety of nonprofits developing technology to better the environment.

“When I started working in the veteran art field, I didn’t see myself as a big leader. I’m quite shy, but I did see that there’s a lot of my friends that didn’t come back or weren’t able to advocate for themselves and so that’s how I ended up in the field that I’m in.” Amber Zora said.

” South Dakota is an amazing place with great people. we have amazing natural resources and I’d love to see us make even better use of them in ways that will improve the triple bottom line of sustainability for the entire state.” David O’Hara said.

More than 2,000 people have received support from the Fellowship during the past 60 years. This year, only 24 leaders were chosen from the 582 applicants.

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