Connections Should Not Depend on Proximity: A Pilot Buddy Program

When our team sat down to pick a project, we kept coming back to the same observation: Duke has no shortage of brilliant, interesting people in graduate programs and postdocs. What it lacks is a structured way for them to find each other.

That is the gap our team set out to address as part of the Emerging Leaders Institute (ELI) 2026 team project. Over the course of this program, we came together from four very different corners of Duke (a genetics Ph.D. student, a global health master’s student, a population health master’s student, and a postdoctoral fellow in mechanical engineering) to ask: what would it look like to actually build community infrastructure for graduate students and postdocs?

The Problem: Connection Isn’t Built into the System

Graduate students and postdocs face a particular kind of loneliness, one that coexists with constant hustle. You are surrounded by people, but most of your connections stay within your department, your lab, or your program. Interdisciplinary friendships are rare not because people do not want them, but because there is no natural mechanism to form them. Add to that the pressure of deadlines, qualifying exams, and research milestones, and community-building starts to feel like just another item on an already overwhelming to-do list.

We kept returning to the same insight during our early team discussions: people are not failing to connect because they do not want to. They are failing to connect because no one has made it easy. The infrastructure simply does not exist.

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Our Solution: A Pilot Buddy Program

We designed a Duke-wide Buddy Program, a simple, structured way for graduate students and postdocs to be matched with peers outside their department based on shared interests. The model was intentionally low-pressure: no formal time requirements, no expectations beyond an introduction. Just a nudge to go outside your comfort zone to make connections.

Participants could sign up for a one-on-one match or opt into a “double-buddy” option (joining with a friend and being matched with two others) creating a small group of four. Sign-up happened through a Qualtrics form that asked about departments, career interests, hobbies, geographic location, and social preferences. We then matched participants manually based on complementary interests, connecting people across programs who might otherwise never cross paths. We collaborated with Graduate and Professional Student Government (GPSG) to host a kick-off event on March 30, 2026, giving matched pairs a low-stakes, in-person setting to meet for the first time.

Preparing for the Launch: Collaboration and Outreach

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Getting people to sign up for a brand-new, untested program in a matter of few weeks required a lot of effort. We leaned on multi-channel outreach through departmental and school listservs, group chats, and word-of-mouth, along with a flyer with a QR code that linked directly to the sign-up form. 

We reached out to GPSG early. Receiving their endorsement made a real difference in legitimizing the program to potential participants. They also featured our program in their weekly newsletter that extended our reach far beyond our own individual networks.

Result: 49 Sign-ups and Three Big Insights

We received 49 sign-ups in our pilot window: 47 graduate students and 2 postdocs. We noticed especially strong interest from students in smaller programs, who may have fewer built-in community touchpoints within their departments.

Three things stood out from the process:

1. There is genuine demand for connection: People signed up willingly for something that was not an established program already. That takes a certain kind of openness, and we got really motivated by it.

2. Simplicity matters: A short form, a clear timeline, and no pressure to commit beyond a first meeting lowered the barrier enough that people actually followed through.

3. Infrastructure is the missing piece: The most important thing we learned is that the desire for community is already there. What has been missing is someone who could build the bridge to connect people. 

What We Learned from Building it Together

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Working across departments at ELI gave us a hands-on experience of exactly what we were aiming for. We came to this project as four people who did not know each other, across disciplines that rarely spoke to one another. What helped us move forward was finding the overlapping space where each of us could contribute. 

We also learned that limitations are part of the process, not necessarily a failure. Our pilot was small with manual matching, and we are still gathering feedback on what actually happened between matched pairs after the kick-off. Those are real constraints and they are also exactly the kind of things we want to know so that we can make it better for the next cycle.

What’s Next

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We are planning to collect participant feedback after the initial meetings to refine the matching logic and understand what made connections click (or not). We are also in conversation with GPSG about whether this can be formally adopted as a recurring program each semester, with a more automated matching process and a broader collaborative structure.

In all, we strongly believe that connections should not depend on proximity. The fact that two people share a building, or even a hallway, should not be the only reason they ever talk. Duke has the community. It just needs the infrastructure to let that community find itself.

Acknowledgment: This project was executed in collaboration with Trisha Kibugi (M.S. student in Global Health), Logan Bailey (M.S. student in Population Health Sciences) and Mohsen Farshad, Ph.D. (postdoctoral research associate in Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science). 

AUTHOR

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Anvita Kulshrestha

Ph.D. candidate, Genetics & Genomics 

Anvita Kulshrestha is a fifth-year Ph.D. candidate in the University Program in Genetics & Genomics (UPGG). Working with Dr. Allison Ashley-Koch, she is investigating the genetic underpinnings of clinical heterogeneity in Sickle Cell Disease. Originally from Delhi, India, she completed undergraduate degrees in molecular & cell biology and nutritional sciences & toxicology from the University of California, Berkeley. In between her undergraduate and graduate studies, Anvita worked as a research associate at Yale School of Medicine. Beyond her research, she is actively involved with student organizations and serves on campus-wide committees. In her free time, she enjoys making art and doing calligraphy.