Honors student lindsey cook wins ap-google award

Rising Honors senior Lindsey Cook was one of six national winners of a $20,000 scholarship awarded yesterday by the Associated Press and Google, targeting students “exemplifying the new journalist in the digital media age.”

Lindsey aims to promote computer science among female journalism students with her project, journochiCS. She is studying journalism and computer science at UGA.

Lindsey, who was the Social Media Editor at The Red & Black, is currently interning with the Washington Post.

Watch her application video, in which she describes combining her interests in journalism and technology.

A past participant in the Honors in Washington internship program, Lindsey worked last summer for Voice of America. In addition, she interned at the Athens Banner-Herald/OnlineAthens.com.

“There’s nothing more exciting than seeing these new journalist hybrids emerging from our colleges across the U.S. through this program,” said Jane McDonnell, Online News Association Executive Director. “While digital media professionals continue to evolve the game, these students will transform the playing field.”

uga students participate in honors internship program

Fourteen University of Georgia students have been selected to participate in the UGA Honors Internship Program and will spend their summer working as interns in a variety of programs in Washington, D.C., New York, and Savannah. The Honors Program students, who underwent a rigorous application process, are working 40-hour weeks in professional settings related to their academic interests and career goals. The internship sites include congressional and law offices as well as media and trade organizations.

“This summer’s Honors Program interns are a truly exceptional group, and we look forward to hearing about their achievements,” said Maria de Rocher, coordinator of Honors Programming. “We are also very appreciative of the countless hours alumni in these cities dedicate to our students—organizing gatherings, serving as mentors, and introducing our students to the array of professional opportunities awaiting them after graduation.”

Eleven students will intern in Washington, D.C. through the Honors in Washington Program. Two students will intern in New York City, while one will intern in Savannah. Read more about the program's participants.

Honors students win 2013 Goldwater, truman, and udall scholarships

Philip Grayeski, a junior Honors student majoring in genetics and chemistry, has been named a 2013 Barry M. Goldwater Scholar. The scholarship recognizes exceptional sophomores and juniors in engineering, mathematics, and the natural sciences. He intends to pursue a combined M.D./Ph.D. degree with a focus on gene therapy and translating academic research into treatments for cancer and hereditary disorders. Tuan Nguyen, a Ramsey Scholar and CURO Honors Scholar majoring in biochemistry and molecular biology as well as mathematics, earned a Goldwater Honorable Mention. UGA students have received the Goldwater Scholarship almost every year since the mid-1990s. The 2013 recipient brings the university's total of Goldwater Scholars to 44.

Phil is a UGA Foundation Fellow who works in the genetics laboratory of assistant professor Jonathan Eggenschwiler. He also has conducted research with UGA genetics professor Janet Westpheling as part of the U.S. Department of Energy's BioEnergy Science Center. He spent three months at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany researching genetic approaches for targeting melanoma treatments. He has presented his research findings at the UGA Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities Symposium and at a meeting of the European Society of Gene and Cell Therapy in Versailles, France.

He is the co-founder and executive director of Whatever It Takes at UGA, where he coordinates a network of more than 300 student volunteers for educational and health and wellness programs targeting families in Athens Clarke-County. He directs two after-school programs in Athens and manages 40 volunteers at each location to provide a one-to-one ratio of tutors to students. He served as vice president of programming for the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity and coaches three boys basketball teams for the Oconee County Parks and Recreation Department. In 2012, he travelled to Peru to assemble mobile clinics in medically underserved communities.

Smitha Ganeshan, an Honors student and Foundation Fellow majoring in anthropology at the University of Georgia, has received a 2013 Harry S. Truman Scholarship, which recognizes juniors with exceptional leadership potential who are committed to careers in government and elsewhere in public service. She is the 18th UGA recipient of the scholarship since 1982, the first year UGA students won the award.

Smitha, who aims to pursue a dual M.D. and Master in Public Policy degree, is active in health care and health policy issues in Athens and across the globe.

She has been involved with UGA’s Roosevelt Institute, a student-run think tank, since her freshman year and currently directs its health policy center and its environmental policy center. Through the Roosevelt Institute, she developed a policy proposal to improve access to primary care services for low income and uninsured patients.

Smitha volunteers at the non-profit Athens Nurses Clinic, which provides basic primary care and dental services for uninsured patients, and has interned at the Athens Health Network, an organization that works to reduce health care disparities by coordinating health services for the indigent population. She is a co-founder of the Lunchbox Garden Project, an after-school nutrition education and obesity prevention program that was launched in 2011 and now serves two schools in Athens through a grant from UGA’s Office of Sustainability.
As an intern at the Greater New York Hospital Association, Smitha worked under Executive Vice President and General Counsel Susan C. Waltman, a trustee of the UGA Foundation and an alumna, to translate evidence-based obesity prevention models into programs for hospital implementation. She has studied at Oxford University through the UGA at Oxford program and interned at the World Health Organization’s M.V. Hospital for Diabetes in Chennai, India, where she worked as a member of the epidemiology team. The following winter, she worked at a mobile health clinic in Lima, Peru and later that year assisted a physician at a community health clinic in Nicaragua.

Two University of Georgia Honors students were among 50 students nationwide who were awarded 2013 Morris K. Udall and Stewart L. Udall Foundation Scholarships. The scholarships are awarded annually to outstanding sophomores and juniors pursuing careers focused on environmental or Native American public policy. The recipients bring the university's total of Udall Scholars to 12 in the past 10 years.

This year's recipients are Sara Black, a junior Foundation Fellow who is pursuing degrees in anthropology and ecology, and Ian Karra, a junior who is pursuing degrees in economics and finance. Matthew Tyler, a junior Honors student and Foundation Fellow from Atlanta who is pursuing a dual bachelor's and master's degree in political science from the School of Public and International Affairs, received an honorable mention.

Sara plans to pursue a career in the environmental or food justice non-profit sector. She has held national leadership positions in prominent grassroots organizations, including the Real Food Challenge, the Greenhorns, the Sierra Club and the Sierra Student Coalition, where she currently works to coordinate trainings on grassroots organizing skills for young people. She is also a co-founder of Real Food UGA, a campus organization working with Food Services on sustainability initiatives. She has participated in the UGA Washington Semester program and studied at Oxford University in the United Kingdom. In addition to being a Foundation Fellow and a National Merit Scholar, she is a member of Blue Key Honor Society and Palladia Honor Society for women.

Ian plans to pursue a career in grassroots environmental advocacy, influencing renewable energy policy at the state level and at institutions of higher education. He represented the U.S. as a youth delegate to the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Qatar and will represent the Sierra Club and UGA as an ambassador to the Clinton Global Initiative University Conference this month. Ian also spent a semester working and studying tropical ecology through UGA Costa Rica. He is on the executive board of the UGA Sierra Student Coalition and a founding member of the UGA Beyond Coal campaign, which aims to replace the university's coal-fired boiler with renewable sources of energy.

Ian and Sara co-lead Georgia YES (Youth for Environmental Solutions), a network of more than 75 student environmental leaders on more than a dozen campuses in Georgia. The organization works to promote clean energy infrastructure and policy on college campuses throughout the state.

Honors student elizabeth allan named 2013 rhodes scholar

University of Georgia Honors student Juliet Elizabeth Allan of Atlanta has been awarded a 2013 Rhodes Scholarship to attend England's Oxford University, where she plans to pursue a master's degree in Modern Middle Eastern Studies. She is one of 32 Rhodes recipients in the United States.

Allan, who is a UGA Foundation Fellow, plans to graduate from UGA in December with bachelor's degrees in Arabic, economics, and international affairs as well as a master's degree in international policy.

Allan is UGA's fourth Rhodes Scholar in the past six years. Before Allan, UGA's most recent recipient was Tracy Yang in 2011.

Allan has traveled to six different continents through various UGA study abroad programs. She studied Arabic in Morocco through the State Department's Critical Language Scholarship and, separately, as part of a UGA Maymester program. Ultimately, she would like to serve in the State Department's Office of Policy Planning.

"I am beyond excited to have the opportunity to study at Oxford next year, and I look forward to deepening my understanding of the Middle East through my studies," Allan said. "The entire process has been extremely humbling and fulfilling. I want to thank my family, friends, the University of Georgia, the Foundation Fellowship at UGA and my high school community of The Westminster Schools in Atlanta."

Allan is a member of UGA's chapter of the Roosevelt Institute, a national student-run think tank, where she has written papers about energy policy and education and has also taught policy analysis to undergraduates. Allan has participated in the university's Center for Undergraduate Research Symposium and presented results of her research on employment dynamics at two national conferences. She has also interned at the university's Carl Vinson Institute of Government, through which she traveled to China during an annual training program the institute conducts in Beijing.

Allan has served as the co-director of the Thomas Lay After School Tutoring Program, where more than 100 UGA students provide educational help to elementary and middle school students in Athens each semester. She also has researched issues involving early childhood education. She is a Presidential Scholar and member of the Phi Kappa Phi, Palladia, and Blue Key honor societies. Read her interview in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and her profile on this site.

Another record year of Fulbright scholarships awarded to UGA students

Seventeen University of Georgia students were offered international travel-study grants from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program for the 2012-2013 academic year. Fourteen of these accepted the scholarships. This exceeds UGA’s previous record of 11 Fulbright offers in each of the previous two years.

Profiles of UGA's 2012-2013 Fulbright Scholars

For the past 66 years, the Fulbright Program has provided students, scholars and professionals an opportunity to pursue advanced research projects, graduate study and teaching assistantships worldwide. Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, the Fulbright Program is the largest U.S. international exchange program. The Fulbright U.S. Student Program awards approximately 1,700 grants annually to U.S. undergraduate and graduate students.

“The record number of UGA Fulbright grants awarded again this year demonstrates the continued commitment of our students, faculty and staff to international education,” said Maria de Rocher, campus Fulbright U.S. Student Program adviser and program coordinator in the Honors Program. “It has been a great pleasure to get to know these students, each representing such different academic interests and backgrounds, but all of whom are clearly devoted to serving as cultural ambassadors and deepening our understanding of the wider world.” Read more...

UGA Honors students win 4 goldwater scholarships & 3 Udall scholarships

Four undergraduate Honors students at the University of Georgia have been named 2012 Barry M. Goldwater Scholars. They are among a group of 291 recipients of the one- and two-year scholarships that recognize exceptional sophomores and juniors in engineering, mathematics and the natural sciences.

UGA was one of only four schools in the nation with the maximum of four Goldwater Scholars this year! Congratulations to Victoria DeLeo, Marianne Ligon, Theresa Stratmann, and Buck Trible! Read more about them here.

The spring has been something of a scholarship bonanza for UGA students. In addition to the four Goldwater awardees, kudos are due to UGA's three Udall Scholars, Heather Hatzenbuhler, Malavika Rajeev, and Theresa Stratmann.

It is worth noting that only one other university in the country had three Udall winners this year. The Morris K. Udall and Stewart L. Udall Foundation Scholarships are awarded annually to outstanding sophomores and juniors pursuing careers with an environmental or Native American public policy focus. Read more about UGA's 2012 Udall Scholars here.

In addition, 17 Fulbright Scholarships have been awarded to UGA undergrad and grad students, 10 National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowships have been awarded to former/current/future UGA students, and current undergrads have won five Boren Scholarships. More on that good news below!

UGA students participate in Honors Internship Program this summer

Honors Internship Program are spending their summer serving as interns in a variety of programs in Washington, DC, New York, and Savannah. The students, who underwent a rigorous application process, are working 40-hour weeks in professional settings related to their academic interests and career goals. The internship sites include non-profit organizations, congressional and law offices, think tanks and media companies.

“We are especially proud to be celebrating the 10th anniversary of the HIW program,” said Maria de Rocher, coordinator of Honors programming. “Our interns’ impressive accomplishments during the past decade undoubtedly helped build UGA’s outstanding reputation in the nation’s capital."

Washington, DC interns include rising juniors Yuliya Bila, Lindsey Cook, Nick Eberhart, and Tucker Green, and rising seniors Scott Cogar, David Mapp, Sarah Edwards, Emily Fountain, Alexandra Hebdon, Charles Spalding, and Alexander Vey. Interns in New York include rising juniors Smitha Ganeshan and Osama Hashmi, while rising senior Kaya Porter is working in Savannah. Read more...

5 uga students awarded boren scholarships for study abroad

Five University of Georgia undergraduates – a record number – will be spending the next academic year participating in language study abroad programs thanks to the National Security Education Program David L. Boren Undergraduate Scholarship. The UGA Boren Scholars are juniors Tia Ayele, Malena Lopez-Sotelo, and John Esteban Rodriguez, and seniors Christian Conroy and David Gutiérrez.

“Already this year, UGA students have received the maximum number of Goldwater scholarships allowed per institution, and set new institutional records with Udall and Fulbright scholarships, so to have a new record number of Boren recipients as well is very exciting,” said David S. Williams, associate provost and director of UGA’s Honors Program.

“Taken together, this level of success underscores that UGA is now a national leader in major scholarship competitions. I know our five new Boren Scholars will take full advantage of the immersive experiences this stellar scholarship provides.” Read more…

10 NSF Graduate Research Fellowships Awarded

Ten University of Georgia students and alumni received graduate research fellowships this spring from the National Science Foundation to conduct research during their master's and doctoral studies. The NSF fellowships are among the most sought-after in the United States. The awards provide students with up to $126,000 during a five-year period for research in the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Sixteen students and alumni also received honorable mentions.

Christine Akoh will graduate this spring with a bachelor of science in agriculture in food science. After graduation, she will pursue a doctorate in human nutrition at Cornell University. Akoh is a 2010 Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship recipient and a member of the UGA Honors Program. Her project seeks to increase the amount of bioavailable iron normally consumed by pregnant women to improve their iron absorption.

As an undergraduate, Ariel Chan majored in food science and technology. She was a member of the UGA Honors Program, and conducted research through the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities at UGA's Center for Applied Genetic Technology. She plans to earn a master's degree in plant breeding and genetics from Cornell University. Her research proposal focused on the biocontainment of genetically modified plants.

Read about other NSF Graduate Fellowship recipients here.

matt sellers wins 2012 marshall scholarship

Honors Program student and Foundation Fellow Matthew Sellers recalls his first time at Oxford University, where he encountered a demanding academic environment as a freshman.

“It’s one of the most intellectually stimulating places I’ve ever been,” he said. “It fosters not just critical thinking but independence that you don’t get in a classroom elsewhere. It made me a better researcher and writer and motivated me in new ways.”

Now he will return as a 2012 Marshall Scholar to pursue graduate studies in the United Kingdom. He is the fifth UGA student to earn the award in the past decade.

“I’m looking forward to that same environment where everyone is engaged with work and where you have the opportunity to really dig into some heavy scholarship,” he said. “It’s also an international university that attracts students from around the globe, and I’m looking forward to meeting and interacting with all these people from different cultures.”

After graduating from UGA in May with a bachelor’s degree in English and a minor in history, Matt will pursue a master of studies program in modern literature followed by a doctor of philosophy program in English language and literature.

At Oxford, he will unite the two sides of himself – the one that enjoys literary analysis and the other that digs into applied policy. Envisioning a future as a professor, he hopes to take scholarly pursuit and make it accessible to others, sharing literature with his community in a way that helps members identify with themselves.

“I’ve attended a public land-grant university, where the work I’m doing should inform the constituents of UGA and Georgia as a whole. This motto ‘to serve’ is a mindset that I’m carrying with me to Oxford,” Matt said. “The work I’m doing is not solely theoretical or esoteric amongst the academy. It just as much needs to be a dialogue about literature, art, and culture that takes place on all levels, from the kitchen table to the seminar table, because the works I’m reading are important for everyone to dig into and understand.”

Matt’s grasp on policy is apparent through his various internships with National Association of Counties in Washington, DC through the Honors in Washington program; Organizing for America in Athens, GA; the U.S. Department of Education and the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools in Washington, DC; the University of Georgia Press; and the Carl Vinson Institute of Government in Athens, GA.

Matt has served in several leadership roles with UGA’s chapter of the Roosevelt Institute, a national student-run think tank, and with UGA’s Journal for Undergraduate Research Opportunities, an online publication encompassing all disciplines.

“Fusing the study of English literature with policy, politics, and curriculum development, I’ve integrated my passion for words with various academic and professional areas of study,” Matt said. “Whoever said English isn’t a relevant course of study apparently didn’t understand the achievement gap – a gap which I hope to close by developing culturally relevant curricula.”

Matt knew that he wanted to study literature after completing a research project as a 2009 summer fellow with the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. Matt focused on the poetry of Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Penn Warren under the guidance of English professor Hugh Ruppersburg, who serves as interim dean of UGA’s Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. In his thesis, Matt explored how Warren depicts populism and populist leaders in fiction and compared those representations to current grassroots political movements.

“I plan to build on this research at Oxford, interrogating how literature … explores the changing experience of individuality in a globalized world while asserting the importance of selfhood – a celebration of difference rather than of divisiveness,” Matt wrote in his Marshall application.

Matt traveled to India and the United Kingdom through the Foundation Fellowship and has also been to France and Italy as a member of the UGA Chamber Choir in the Hodgson School of Music. Last year, he taught English and mathematics in a primary school in Tanzania, where he embraced his plans to move forward as a professor.

“On the edge of my recently expanded world, I realized the vital importance of a shared story as a way of communicating experience across cultural and political boundaries. I received a call to action from the improbable confluence of poetry and my students' stories: to celebrate the diversity of human experience by leveraging the power of the narrative.”

In a literary sense, this “call to action” describes the moment when main characters discover purpose. For Matt, the call beckons him to Oxford to study postcolonial literature.

“Until Africa, I never realized how powerfully emotive the call can be,” Matt said. “There’s a grand arc of human history, but along the way, there are so many narrative threads that flow into that arc. It’s important for scholars to weave them together to give a broader understanding of what it means to be human.”

UGA alumna a.e. stallings wins coveted macarthur genius grant

University of Georgia alumna A.E. (Alicia) Stallings ('90) has been selected as a 2011 MacArthur Fellow by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. The MacArthur Fellowship is given annually to talented individuals throughout the world who have shown extraordinary originality and dedication in their creative pursuits and a marked capacity for self-direction. Recipients represent a variety of fields and are selected based on three criteria, which include exceptional creativity, promise for important future advances based on a track record of significant accomplishments, and a potential for their fellowship to facilitate subsequent creative work. The fellowship is often referred to as the "genius award" and comes with an unrestricted stipend of $500,000 to the recipient.

Stallings was recognized for her work as a poet and translator. Originally from Decatur, Ga. but now residing in Athens, Greece, Stallings majored in Latin while at student in UGA's Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. She was in the Honors Program and came to UGA on a Foundation Fellowship, the university's premier undergraduate scholarship that offers exceptional opportunities for international travel.

Stallings later received her master's at Oxford University in England. Currently, she is the poetry program director of the Athens Centre and is married to John Psaropoulos, who is the editor of the Athens News.

Stallings' debut poetry collection, Archaic Smile, received the 1999 Richard Wilbur Award and was a finalist for both the Yale Younger Poets Series and the Walt Whitman Award. Her second collection, Hapax (2006), was awarded the 2008 Poets' Prize. In 2007 she published a verse translation of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (The Nature of Things), which, according to UGA Emeritus Professor Rick LaFleur, "...is surely among the most complex and startling of all surviving classical Latin poetry."

Her poems have appeared in The Best American Poetry anthologies of 1994 and 2000. She has been awarded a Pushcart Prize, the Eunice Tietjens Prize, the 2004 Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award and the James Dickey Prize. In 2010, she was awarded the Willis Barnstone Translation Prize, and earlier this year, she won a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Stallings is the second UGA alumna to receive a MacArthur Fellowship. Beth Shapiro, who was also an Honors student and Foundation Fellow and earned her master's and bachelor's degrees in ecology from UGA in 1999, received the recognition in 2009. Read Alicia's three-minute interview in the Red and Black.

curo Associate director interviewed for focus on faculty

UGA's Focus on Faculty recently featured CURO Associate Director Dr. William Kisaalita, who has developed research activities and international service-learning projects that have engaged students in helping solve real-world problems.

Dr. Kisaalita is a professor of engineering with research responsibilities in two areas: 1) Base of the Pyramid (BoP) technology development done with undergraduate students; and 2) cell-based biosensors with applications in drug discovery.

He was recently appointed Associate Director of the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities, with responsibilities for working directly with colleges/schools, departments, and faculty to promote the expansion of CURO to all students interested in undergraduate research. Read more...

UGA ties its record for fulbright scholarships

Eleven University of Georgia students were named recipients of international travel-study grants from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program for the 2011-2012 academic year. This ties last year's record number. Nine of the students accepted the scholarships.

The U.S. Student Full Grants, which cover research, study and creative opportunities, were given to five UGA graduate students. The English Teaching Assistantship Grants, which provide recipients with placements in schools and universities to serve as language-learning assistants, were given to four students who earned undergraduate degrees at UGA. Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, the Fulbright Program is the largest U.S. international exchange program.

Profiles of UGA's Current and Past Fulbright Scholars

"Selection for this national honor is evidence of our students' enormous talent and dedication to making a real difference in the world," said Maria de Rocher, UGA's campus Fulbright U.S. Student Program adviser. "It has been thrilling to witness so many of our students produce compelling research projects, all seeking to make connections with the international community in innovative ways." Read more...

UGA Students spent summer studying critical languages abroad

Ten University of Georgia students participated in summer language institutes abroad as recipients of 2011 Critical Language Scholarships from the U.S. Department of State.

The U.S. Department of State created the Critical Language Scholarships for Intensive Summer Institutes program in 2006 to increase opportunities for U.S. students to study critical-need languages abroad that are deemed essential to the U.S. in fostering international relations. These ten UGA recipients are among the approximately 575 undergraduate and graduate students from across the country who participated in seven- to ten-week intensive immersion programs in 13 languages, including Arabic, Chinese and Turkish.

The summer 2011 participants who studied Arabic abroad are seniors Elizabeth Allan of Atlanta; Amnah Hillou of Lawrenceville; Mai Himedan of Lawrenceville; Matthew Sweat of Fayetteville; junior Christelle Lorin of Kennesaw; and recent spring graduate Laura Eaton of Watkinsville.

Senior Aisha Mahmood of Kennesaw studied in China, while seniors Amarachi Anukam of Athens and Samantha Gray of Springfield, Va. traveled to Japan. Duncan Lien of Atlanta, another spring graduate, studied in Turkey. Read more...

honors in washington intern interviews honors graduate for voa

Heather Hatzenbuhler, a 2011 Honors in Washington intern with Voice of America, interviewed former VOA intern and UGA Honors graduate Yasmin Yonis for VOA's "In Focus" program on TV2Africa.

aaron marshburn wins daad scholarship

Foundation Fellow Aaron Marshburn earlier this year received a Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD) Scholarship to spend six weeks at Freie Universität Berlin’s International Center for Journalism. To gain insight into the perspectives and positions at play in 21st century geopolitics, Marshburn joined more than a dozen other German-speaking American journalism students over the summer to develop their academic awareness of the politics, society, and culture of Germany, as well as the media structure and working conditions for journalists in that country. The program also placed Marshburn with a German-based media outlet for a five-week internship designed to facilitate entry into the country’s communications industry and hone the skills necessary to find a job there.

Marshburn, who in May earned degrees in journalism and international affairs from UGA, says, "Everyone has a story to tell. It doesn’t matter how old they are, rich or poor, educated or not – there is something you can learn from every single person in the world.”

Besides working a part-time job at CNN’s Idea Lab in Atlanta, Aaron has taken a hands-on foreign correspondence course in Prague, worked as a volunteer for special-needs children at a camp in Zimbabwe, and has had travel-study stints in Cambodia, Costa Rica, England, Fiji, and Thailand.

“Cultural understanding is about reaching peak moments of existence that break down the elusive barriers separating one person from another,” says Marshburn, who in 2010 was honored by UGA’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication as a McGill Fellow. “From the refugee camps along the troubled Thai-Burma border to Xhosa primary schools in the rough townships of South Africa’s eastern cape, I’ve spent every summer learning to tell stories that matter.”

The program that perhaps had the most impact on Marshburn’s interest in international journalism was the 11-day foreign correspondents course he took in Prague, where he “toured Radio Free Europe and engaged in focused discussions with international media professionals representing The New York Times and The Economist, among others,” he says. “In the second part of the course, I planned and executed a piece of original reportage about the prospective expansion of the Temelin Nuclear Power Plant near the Austrian border.”

interdisciplinary field program features spot gps link

The eight-week Interdisciplinary Field Program integrates geology, anthropology, and ecology in the field, rather than in the classroom. The course is taught on-the-road during the summer, traveling coast-to-coast. Students learn primarily from lectures and laboratory exercises in the field, group projects, and museum visits. Check out their SPOT GPS page that tracks the location and route of the program.

students gain real-world experience through Honors Internships

Thirteen undergraduates in the University of Georgia Honors Program have been chosen for summer internships in Washington, D.C., New York, and Savannah through the Honors Internship Program. Since 2001, the Honors Program has provided participants the opportunity to explore more fully their academic interests and career goals by working 40 hours a week side-by-side with professionals in a variety of settings.

Internship sites include congressional and law offices, media companies, think tanks, non-profit organizations, and executive agencies.The interns undergo a rigorous selection process and receive stipends to offset travel and living expenses. Read more...

UGA undergraduates awarded 2011 CURO summer research fellowships

Twenty-five University of Georgia undergraduates have been selected to participate in inquiry-based research projects this summer through the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. The student investigators, awarded 2011 CURO Summer Research Fellowships, will be delving into topics related to their fields of interest. Faculty mentors in those disciplines provide guidance and support. Read more...

Honors Students awarded Boren language scholarships

Two UGA students have received 2011 National Security Education Program David L. Boren Scholarship for language study abroad during the 2011-2012 academic year. The scholarship (for one semester or a full academic year) aims to give recipients the skills to work in fields deemed important to U.S. national security through the study of less commonly taught foreign languages and immersion in those cultures. Rosemary Gay will spend the fall semester studying Portuguese in Brazil at the Universidade Federal do Parana. She will be enrolled in agronomy courses and involved in research focused on improving soil fertility. Gay will begin her trip this summer, working on an organic farm in rural Brazil through the World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms program. Laying the groundwork to pursue a career in sustainable agricultural development in Latin America. During spring 2010, she took courses in sustainable agriculture and forestry practices at EARTH University in Costa Rica. Neenah Williams plans to enroll in the Arabic for Non-Native Speakers Program at Qatar University in Doha for one year. “Being able to study abroad for a year to focus on Arabic is such an honor as an undergraduate, and this experience will give me invaluable knowledge that no textbook can provide," said Williams, who transferred to UGA to major in Arabic with aspirations to become a dialect analyst specializing in the Arabian Gulf. Read more...

Thirteen UGA students awarded NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

Thirteen University of Georgia students and alumni have won National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships, one of the most prestigious and sought-after fellowships in the United States. The Graduate Research Fellowship Program provides master’s and doctoral students with up to $121,500 during a five-year period for research projects in the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The same number of UGA students and alumni received the award last year, while the number of honorable mentions rose to 17, up from seven in the previous year. Read more...

yasmin yonis wins merage american dream fellowship

Fourth-year Honors student Yasmin Yonis has been named a 2011 Merage American Dream Fellow. She is the sixth consecutive UGA student to receive this award since 2006. Yasmin, who is pursuing bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and journalism, is one of 10 national winners of the fellowship. She also earned a 2010 Truman Scholarship. Born in Somalia, Yasmin and her family came to the U.S. as refugees from the civil war. With this personal history as the driving force, she has prepared for a career in human and civil rights law and public policy working with marginalized communities in the U.S. and abroad. Yasmin has served as opinions editor of The Red & Black newspaper. She also has international reporting experience as an intern for Voice for America through UGA’s Honors in Washington Program. She recently returned from a trip to Ethiopia’s semi-autonomous Somali region where she worked as an intern with an international aid organization. With additional interests in public policy, Yonis has completed research addressing African women’s empowerment through Roosevelt@UGA and interning at the Carl Vinson Institute of Government. She participated as one of 10 law fellows in the University of California’s Public Policy and International Affairs Junior Summer Institute. Yasmin has served as the political action chair of the Black Affairs Council at UGA and as a tutor and mentor for students of color. Read more...

todd pierson named 2011 udall scholar

For the fourth consecutive year, a UGA undergraduate has been named a recipient of the Udall Scholarship. Todd Pierson, a second-year Honors student and Foundation Fellow, is one of 80 recipients of the national award, which recognizes sophomores and juniors who are pursuing careers in environmental or Native American issues. With the goal of combining a research and teaching career focused on ecological conservation, Todd has been conducting amphibian ecology research since he started at UGA. He has worked in the laboratory of John Maerz in UGA’s Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources and worked as a researcher, web designer, and photographer under the guidance of John Pickering in UGA’s Odum School of Ecology.

Todd has taken his ecology interests abroad, having become involved in a research partnership between the Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala and the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California, Berkeley. He traveled to the highlands of Guatemala in late fall and plans a return trip this April, along with expeditions to Oman and the United Arab Emirates this summer. Read more...

Joyellen freeman selected for pbs 2011 student freedom ride

JoyEllen Freeman, a second-year Honors student, is one of 40 college students selected to participate in the 2011 Student Freedom Ride, a civil rights history bus tour sponsored by PBS’s American Experience series. Read JoyEllen's article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution... Commemorating the 50th anniversary of the 1961 Freedom Rides, the May 6-16 trip kicks off in Washington, D.C. and covers eight southern states. Students on the tour will document their experiences through blogs, online videos, and social media. The Freedom Ride provides a unique opportunity for Freeman to connect with her current research work in the apprentice program of UGA’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. She has been working under the guidance of English professor Barbara McCaskill, co-director of the Civil Rights Digital Library. Read more...

seventeen first-year students awarded UGA's Foundation Fellowship

The class of 2015 will include 17 students who have been awarded the Foundation Fellowship, the university’s premier undergraduate scholarship. The Foundation Fellowship provides academic enrichment and cultural opportunities, including international travel-study, internships, research and conference support, and public service experiences to recipients who exhibit the qualities of outstanding future leaders and scholars. Read more...

five first-year students awarded UGA's Ramsey Honors Scholarship

The class of 2015 will include five students who have been awarded the Bernard Ramsey Honors Scholarship, one of the university’s most prestigious academic awards. The UGA Foundation trustees established the scholarship in 2000 to recognize the university’s most generous individual benefactor, Bernard Ramsey, a 1937 graduate of UGA’s Terry College of Business. Read more...

three UGA Honors students win 2011 goldwater scholarships

Victoria Akin, Michael Burel and Amar Mirza, third-year students enrolled in the University of Georgia Honors Program, have been awarded 2011 Barry M. Goldwater Scholarships, awarded to undergraduates who have outstanding potential and intend to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences, or engineering. UGA students have received this award every year since 1995, and this year’s recipients bring the total to 37 Goldwater Scholars at UGA. Akin, Burel and Mirza were selected from an applicant pool of more than 1,000 candidates who were nominated by their colleges and universities. Tori Akin began her research activities in epidemiology modeling after her freshman year at UGA, working under the guidance of epidemiologist and statistician Andreas Handel in UGA’s College of Public Health. She created a computer program that simulates the progression of influenza, gathering data to support more efficient production of antiviral drugs. Since fall, she has been involved in numerical analysis research with mathematics professor Jason Cantarella.  Last summer, Akin participated in the National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates. She also teaches math concepts to middle school children through the MathCounts Outreach Program. Last May, Akin taught math and phonetics to young children during a service abroad trip to Tanzania. She plans to obtain a Ph.D. in mathematics and pursue a career in higher education as a researcher and professor. Michael Burel was introduced to UGA undergraduate research when he was named a CURO Promising Scholar as a high school senior. He went on to become a CURO Apprentice at UGA, working in the laboratory of Steven Stice, Georgia Research Alliance Scholar in Reproductive Physiology. Michael conducted research in France last summer through New York University’s Summer Undergraduate Research Program and will continue this summer at NYU’s Sackler Institute of Graduate Biomedical Sciences. He has presented his stem cell research at the Institut Jacques Monod in Paris and will give a presentation at the upcoming CURO Symposium, as he did last year. He plans to pursue a doctorate in developmental biology and become a university professor and researcher. Amar Mirza has been working in the biochemistry and molecular biology laboratory of Natarajan Kannan since his freshman year and through participation in CURO’s summer research fellowship program. His research has focused on various aspects of the structure and function of protein kinases, a family of proteins that have mutated in cancer. Amar has presented his projects at several symposiums, including the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students in 2009. He also presented at the CURO Symposium last year and will do so again this year. Last summer, he participated in the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Exceptional Research Opportunities Program. He most recently traveled to Haiti and worked in a health clinic during the cholera outbreak through the Partners in Development program. Amar would like to earn an M.D./Ph.D. in molecular biology and pursue a career in genomic medicine. Read more...

ashley bartlett wins 2011 rangel graduate fellowship

Ashley Bartlett, a University of Georgia senior in the Honors Program, has won a 2011 Charles B. Rangel Graduate Fellowship. One of 15 selected nationally, Bartlett is the first UGA recipient of this award that recognizes outstanding students pursuing careers as U.S. Foreign Service diplomats. Ashley will graduate in May with bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and history. In preparation for her foreign service career, she has studied abroad. Through the World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms program, she worked and lived with a family in Japan. She then participated in the UGA at Oxford study abroad program in spring 2009.

As a recipient of a UGA Honors International Scholarship, Ashley studied Mandarin that summer at Zhejiang University of Technology in China. She interned in the Department of State in the Bureau of East Asia and Pacific Affairs through UGA’s Washington Semester Program last spring. She subsequently returned to Washington, D.C. as a Rangel Scholar at Howard University through the Summer Enrichment Program, the undergraduate component of the Rangel International Affairs Program. Read more...

UGA Honors student wins 2011 gates cambridge Scholarship

University of Georgia Honors student Muktha Natrajan has been named a 2011 Gates Cambridge Scholar. Muktha, a UGA Foundation Fellow, is currently pursuing a combined bachelor’s/master’s program at the University of Georgia in which she will earn a BS in genetics and an MPH in environmental health. She has been conducting research on neural stem cell and progenitor cell cultures at UGA in Dr. Steven Stice's lab and has developed a passion for neuroscience. Along with her research experience, she has spearheaded efforts for sustainable solutions through the Go Green Alliance, a coalition of UGA environmental groups. She also works as a grant reviewer with Promote Africa, a student-run non-profit that supports community development projects in Africa. Upon graduating from UGA in May, she plans to pursue a PhD in neuroscience, combining her interests in neuroscience and the environment by studying the effects of extrinsic factors on neural cell growth and development. She eventually intends to work as a researcher and policy analyst at the National Institutes of Health. Read more...

Honors students win campus sustainability grants

The UGA Office of Sustainability awarded Campus Sustainability Grants to three Honors students. Emily Karol, a magazines major in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, will work to install a water bottle refill station in the Miller Learning Center so that students can conveniently “take back the tap” and easily fill their own water bottles as opposed to purchasing bottled water. Sheena Zhang, who is focusing on sustainable design through the Odum School of Ecology and the department of biology, will help establish UGA’s first bikeshare program in the soon-to-be LEED-certified Building 1516 residence hall.

Nick Martin, an environmental health science major in the College of Public Health, will work to enhance the dorm move-out waste reduction program, building upon similar efforts from last year. Working with many campus and community partners, the initiative combines philanthropy and waste reduction to save unwanted but usable dorm furniture and clothing items from the landfill, putting them instead in the hands of people who need them. Items will be collected from UGA residence halls for reuse and donation to Athens area charities. Read more...

three Honors students awarded mid-term foundation fellowships

Three 2011 mid-term Foundation Fellows have been named at the University of Georgia. The Foundation Fellows Program is the university’s premier undergraduate scholarship program and provides academic and cultural enrichment opportunities, including internships, research, and study abroad. The recipients are: JoyEllen Freeman, who is from Alpharetta, Ga. and pursuing bachelor’s degrees in English and English education; Camille Gregory, who is from Brentwood, Tenn. and pursuing a bachelor’s degree in geography; and Waring “Buck” Trible III, who is from Fredericksburg, Va. and pursuing bachelor’s degrees in entomology and ecology. JoyEllen Freeman is already preparing for a teaching career with her current research endeavors as a participant in UGA’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities (CURO) Apprentice program. She has been working under the guidance of English professor Barbara McCaskill, co-director of the Civil Rights Digital Library.

Freeman researches and writes content for the online archive’s companion web site that focuses on Georgia’s civil rights movement. She also serves as a mentor and tutor for adolescents through the Thomas Lay Community Center in Athens. She is a poetry editor for the Mandala Journal, an online student-run multicultural journal published through UGA’s Institute for African American Studies.

Camille Gregory, a UGA Ramsey Scholar who plans to become a human rights lawyer, has been involved with the Roosevelt Institute, the UGA chapter of a national student-run think tank. Under the guidance of Raye Rawls, a faculty member in UGA’s Fanning Institute, she prepared a policy paper analyzing domestic violence assessments used during divorce mediation. Parts of this paper were included in a recent edition of the Georgia Domestic Violence Benchbook. Gregory’s extracurricular activities include serving on the executive board of the Not For Sale student organization, which fights against human trafficking in the U.S. She also mentors a local high school student and is involved with Whatever It Takes Athens, a community initiative addressing local cradle-to-career educational concerns.

Buck Trible, who is interested in pursuing an entomological research career in academia, has been conducting research on the invasive South American fire ants that are found in Georgia. He worked under the guidance of entomology professor Kenneth Ross. Trible plans to investigate the interaction between fire ants and coffee farms at UGA’s Costa Rica campus later this year. He has been a summer camp counselor and entomology instructor for middle and high school students for the Nature Camp Federation in Virginia. He is currently involved with campus conservation and sustainability initiatives through the UGA Ecology Club, the Students for Environmental Action and the Game Day Recycling Initiative after home football games. 

UGA Honors student named 2011 Rhodes Scholar

University of Georgia Honors student Tracy Yang of Macon has been awarded a 2011 Rhodes Scholarship to attend England's Oxford University, where she will pursue an MSc in global health science. Tracy is a UGA Foundation Fellow, and she was also a 2010 Truman Scholar. She plans to graduate from UGA in May with a bachelor’s degree in anthropology. Tracy is one of 32 Rhodes recipients in the United States and the only one from the state of Georgia. She is UGA’s 22nd Rhodes Scholar. Before her, UGA’s most recent recipients were Deep Shah and Kate Vyborny in 2008. With aspirations to pursue a career as a physician-policy analyst, Tracy has concentrated her research as well as her local and international involvement on efforts to address public health disparities and improving access to services. Read more...

UGA Honors alumna named 2011 Mitchell Scholar

Betsy Katz of Thomasville, a 2009 graduate from the University of Georgia Honors Program, is one of 12 national recipients of a 2011-2012 George J. Mitchell Scholarship, sponsored by the U.S.-Ireland Alliance. She plans to pursue a master’s degree in intercultural studies at Dublin City University in Ireland. Katz, who earned bachelor’s degrees in mathematics, Spanish, and religion from UGA, is currently teaching secondary mathematics in Richmond, Calif., as a Teach for America participant.  This is the third consecutive year that a UGA student has been named a Mitchell Scholar. The one-year post-graduate fellowship covers studies in any discipline offered by institutions in Ireland and Northern Ireland. Applicants are judged on three criteria: academic excellence, leadership, and a sustained commitment to service and community. As an undergraduate, Katz was the recipient of several academic scholarships, including the Ramsey Honors Scholarship, one of UGA’s most prestigious awards. Read more...

curo apprentices engage in experiential learning

Fifteen first-year students at the University of Georgia have been selected to participate in the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities Apprentice program. They join a group of 13 returning second-year program participants. For the last ten years, undergraduates in their first and second years at UGA have been engaged in experiential, inquiry-based research through the CURO Apprentice program. The current students spend 10-12 hours a week actively engaged in their research projects with their faculty mentors. They also attend a writing-intensive Honors seminar focused on the research process and practices. Read the full article...

record number of Fulbright scholarships awarded to UGA students

For the second consecutive year, a record number of University of Georgia students—eleven—have been awarded scholarships from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. Nine of the students accepted the scholarships for the 2010-2011 academic year. Recipients of the U.S. Student Full Grants, which cover research and study, include Jeremy Akin, April Conway, Virginia Newman, Jennifer Olson, and Abigail Zylla. Recipients of the English Teaching Assistantship Grants will serve as language-learning assistants in schools or universities abroad. Awardees include Carlos Burse, Emily Gauld, John Keith, and Jessica Stewart. Lauren Fisher, received a French Government Teaching Assistantship. Read more...

mimi ensley awarded rotary ambassadorial scholarship

Fourth-year Honors student Mimi Ensley, who will graduate in May with degrees in English and journalism, won a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship to study medieval literature at York University in England in 2011-2012. Read the full article...

Brianna Randall earns American Advertising Federation award

Third-year Honors student Brianna Randall has been awarded an American Advertising Federation's Most Promising Minority Student Scholarship for 2010. Every year, the American Advertising Federation's Mosaic Center on Multiculturalism awards 14 scholarships nationally to outstanding minority students majoring in advertising, marketing, or communications. In addition to the AAF award, Brianna has recently earned the Earl G. Graves NAACP Scholarship and the 100 Black Men Future Leaders Scholarship. In summer 2010, Brianna traveled to Cambodia on an Honors International Scholars Program travel grant. She studied travel writing on a Maymester study abroad program with Professor John Greenman of the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.

UGA undergraduates awarded 2010 CURO summer research fellowships

Twenty-five University of Georgia undergraduates have been selected to participate in inquiry-based research projects this summer through the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. The student investigators, awarded 2010 CURO Summer Research Fellowships, will be delving into topics related to their fields of interest such as marketing, Japanese language and literature, and infectious diseases. Faculty mentors in those disciplines provide guidance and support.

“CURO Summer Fellows have the benefit of an intensive, immersive faculty-guided research opportunity—an unparalleled experience for undergraduates,” said Pamela Kleiber, associate director of UGA’s Honors Program. “To balance this in-depth inquiry, the Summer Fellows also have opportunities to interact with one another and learn about the similarities and differences in how research is approached in different disciplines.” Read the full article...

Honors Internship Program selects summer 2010 participants

Thirteen University of Georgia undergraduates enrolled in the Honors Program have been selected to participate in the Honors Internship Program during summer 2010. With placements in Washington, D.C., New York, and Savannah, these students work 40 hours a week as interns in congressional offices, executive agencies, non-profit organizations, law firms, media companies and think tanks. Read the full article...

Fifteen first-year students awarded UGA's Foundation Fellowship

The class of 2014 will include 15 students who have been awarded the Foundation Fellowship, the university’s premier undergraduate scholarship. The Foundation Fellowship provides academic enrichment and cultural opportunities, including international travel-study, internships, research and conference support, and public service experiences to recipients who exhibit the qualities of outstanding future leaders and scholars. Read the full article...

Eight first-year students awarded UGA's Ramsey Honors Scholarship

The class of 2014 will include eight students who have been awarded the Bernard Ramsey Honors Scholarship, one of the university’s premier academic awards. The UGA Foundation trustees established the scholarship in 2000 to recognize the university’s most generous individual benefactor, Bernard Ramsey, a 1937 graduate of UGA’s Terry College of Business.Ramsey served as chairman of the board of Merrill Lynch for a number of years. Read the full article...

Thirteen UGA students awarded NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

The National Science Foundation has offered 13 Graduate Research Fellowships and seven honorable mentions to University of Georgia students and alumni. The Graduate Research Fellowship Program provides master’s and doctoral students with up to $121,500 over a five-year period for research projects in the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

“Reviewers are looking for the best and the brightest, those with the potential for leadership in their fields of study,” said Gisele Muller-Parker, program director for the GRFP. Since the program’s inception in 1952, thirty Fellows have gone on to become Nobel Laureates. The nine students who earned their bachelor degrees at UGA were also either part of the UGA Honors Program or participated in the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities (CURO). Read the full article...

honors student is fifth consecutive recipient of merage fellowship

Lindel Cecilia Krige, graduating in May 2010 with bachelor’s degrees in biology and psychology, is the fifth consecutive University of Georgia recipient of the Merage Foundation’s American Dream Fellowship. Krige is one of 12 students selected nationally for the award, which provides up to $20,000 over a two-year period to academically exceptional students who are immigrants to the United States. Krige, who emigrated from Johannesburg, South Africa when she was 10 years old, has spent her time at UGA in preparing for a career as a physician and clinical researcher. With interests in infectious diseases and public health, Krige has conducted research in UGA’s Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Diseases for the last two years. Using mouse models, Krige is currently studying the effects of malaria at the placental level during pregnancy.

Krige’s faculty mentor is Julie Moore, a professor in the department of infectious diseases in the UGA College of Veterinary Medicine. She presented this work—the focus of her Honors thesis—at the 2010 undergraduate research symposium that is sponsored every spring by the Honors Program’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. Krige has spent her summers abroad assisting in HIV/AIDS and diabetes clinics and community hospitals in South Africa, Costa Rica and Nicaragua. Read the full article...

Honors Students awarded language scholarships

Two UGA Honors students have received 2010 National Security Education Program David L. Boren Scholarship for year-long language study abroad during the 2010-2011 academic year. The scholarship, usually for one semester or a full academic year, aims to give recipients the skills to work in fields deemed important to U.S. national security through the study of less commonly taught foreign languages and immersion in those cultures. Winn Davis, who will be graduating in May with bachelor's degrees in international affairs and Russian, plans to pursue a graduate degree in Central Eurasian Studies upon his return. Logan Krusac, a sophomore in the Honors Program who is pursuing bachelor’s degrees in political science and Mandarin Chinese, will be studying Mandarin in China on both the Boren Scholarship and a 2010 Critical Language Scholarship from the U.S. Department of State. Krusac, also a recipient of UGA’s Foundation Fellowship, will attend the Institute for International Students at Nanjing University, starting in June. Pursuing a certificate in global studies through UGA’s Center for the Study of Global Issues, he will spend the rest of his junior year in Harbin and Kunming, China, investigating the politics behind the country’s emerging environmental movement. Read the full article...

honors students win udall scholarship and udall honorable mention

Muktha Natrajan, an Honors student and Foundation Fellow at UGA, has received a 2010 Morris K. Udall Scholarship. This national award recognizes sophomores and juniors who are pursuing careers focused on environmental or Native American issues. Natrajan, a third-year student from Martinez, was among a group of 80 Udall Scholars and is the sixth UGA student to receive the scholarship. She is pursuing a combined bachelor’s/master’s program in which she will earn a bachelor of science degree in genetics and a master of public health degree in environmental health science.

Stephen Pettigrew, a third-year Honors student from Alpharetta, is one of 50 students to receive an honorable mention in the scholarship competition. He is pursuing a combined bachelor’s/master’s degree in political science and a bachelor’s degree in history. Read the full article...

two honors students named truman scholars

Two University of Georgia Honors students have been chosen to receive Harry S. Truman Scholarships, a national award recognizing outstanding juniors who are planning careers in government or other public service. UGA’s 2010 Truman Scholars are Tracy Yang of Macon, who is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in anthropology, and Yasmin Yonis of Lawrenceville, who is pursuing bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and journalism (newspapers).

Yang and Yonis are among 60 Truman Scholars selected from an applicant pool of 576 candidates and the only two recipients from the state of Georgia. They are the 16th and 17th UGA recipients of the scholarship since 1982, the first year UGA students won the award.

Yang, who is also a recipient of UGA’s Foundation Fellowship, has served in several leadership roles with UGA’s chapter of the Roosevelt Institution, a national student-run think tank. With her interests in health disparities and improving public health, she is interning with the OneAthens Health Team, part of a community-based initiative to address poverty issues in Athens. Yang will participate in a public health and emergency preparedness internship this summer with the Greater New York Hospital Association through UGA’s Honors Internship Programs. After earning her UGA degree, Yang would like to enter an MPH/MD program and pursue a career as a physician policymaker or health program administrator.

Yonis currently serves as opinions editor of The Red & Black student newspaper. Born in Somalia, she and her family came to the U.S. when she was three as refugees from the civil war.

Through UGA’s Honors in Washington Program, Yonis interned at Voice of America, a multimedia international public broadcasting agency in Washington, DC this past summer. She has participated in public policy research addressing African women’s empowerment through UGA’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government Fellows Program and through UGA’s Roosevelt Institution Scholars Program. She was also named one of UGA's "Amazing Students." Yonis will participate as a law fellow—one of only 10 selected nationally—in the University of California’s 2010 Public Policy and International Affairs Junior Summer Institute.

After graduating from UGA, Yonis would like to pursue a master’s degree in public affairs and a law degree, focusing on a career in human rights law and policy in the U.S. and African nations, including her homeland. Read the full article...

two uga honors students receive 2010 goldwater scholarships

Christine Akoh and Meagan Cauble, recipients of the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarships, were selected from an applicant pool of more than 1,000 candidates who were nominated by their colleges and universities. The national award annually recognizes exceptional undergraduates in mathematics, science and engineering. Akoh, a sophomore from Athens, is pursuing bachelor’s degrees in food science and interdisciplinary applied science. Cauble, a junior from Weaverville, NC, is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and molecular biology.

“Given this nation’s well-documented shortage of graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics – or STEM – programs, it is noteworthy that UGA students have received this award almost every year since 1995,” said UGA President Michael F. Adams. “Christine and Meagan join an esteemed group of 34 past Goldwater winners at UGA, as well as recipients of other national academic scholarships. Bulldogs everywhere can be proud that UGA students can and do compete with the best students from across the nation.”

Akoh was first introduced to international agricultural research when she participated in the Young Scholars Internship Program during high school through UGA’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CAES). She now serves as a mentor for current scholars. Akoh is currently in the second year of the Apprentice Program sponsored by the Honors Program’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities (CURO).  Working in the laboratory of food science and technology professor Joseph Frank, she is focusing on the pathogen Listeria monocytogenes. She continued the research this past summer as a CURO Summer Research Fellow. After earning her UGA degrees in 2012, Akoh plans to pursue a Ph.D. in international nutrition, focusing on global nutrition and health.

Cauble has been conducting nanotechnology research in the laboratory of UGA chemist Marcus Lay since her freshman year. She also co-authored a paper that was published in the Journal of Materials Science in spring 2009.   Cauble has received a research fellowship every summer since the beginning of her UGA career. She participated in UGA’s Summer Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program in 2008 and the National Science Foundation’s Research Experience for Undergraduates in Nanomaterials and Biomaterials Program in 2009.  She was recently selected as a 2010 CURO Summer Research Fellow. Cauble would like to pursue a Ph.D. in chemical and biomolecular engineering after graduating from UGA in 2011. Read the full article...

2010 Curo symposium provides public forum for student research endeavors

More than 200 UGA students will participate in oral presentations, poster sessions and thesis roundtables at the 2010 undergraduate research symposium hosted by the Honors Program’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities. The event will be held March 29 at the Classic Center. UGA anthropology professor Peter Brosius will give the keynote address, “Conservation and the Global Search for Sustainability,” in Athena Ballroom E. Presentation of CURO’s undergraduate research mentoring awards will immediately follow.

“Because of the strong institutional and faculty support for undergraduate research on this campus, CURO has tripled the number of participants since the first symposium in 2000,” said Pamela Kleiber, associate director of UGA’s Honors Program. “The CURO Symposium is unique among research universities.” Read the full article...

engineering research opportunities expanded

Undergraduate research opportunities on campus are being expanded through a partnership between the Honors Program’s Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities and the Faculty of Engineering. The aim of the partnership is to pioneer an effective model for the growth of undergraduate research that can be adapted to expand CURO activities into other UGA academic units.

“Over the past decade, CURO has had an extraordinary impact on the undergraduate students who have taken part in its programs,” said Jere Morehead, senior vice president for academic affairs and provost. “With this important pilot program, administrators in the Honors Program will be working with colleagues in the Faculty of Engineering to explore ways to expand access to more students.” Read the full article...

Deep Shah earns Soros Fellowship

Deep Shah, who was one of the University of Georgia’s two Rhodes Scholars in 2008, recently added to his honors by winning the nationally competitive Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans that will cover up to two years of graduate study in the U.S. He is currently in his first year at Harvard Medical School after earning a master’s degree in comparative social policy at Oxford University.  While at UGA, Shah was a Foundation Fellow and recipient of a 2007 Truman Scholarship. He also served as co-founder and president of the UGA chapter of the Roosevelt Institution, a student-run think tank whose members research and write policy proposals addressing current national issues. He earned bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and biology in 2008. His long-term goals include entering a residency program in primary care and pursuing a career as a physician policymaker. The Soros, who are originally from Hungary, established the fellowship program in 1997 with a $50 million charitable trust. The purpose of the program is to provide opportunities for “New Americans”—those whose country of origin is not the U.S. or whose parents immigrated to the U.S.—in attaining their goals and becoming leaders in their chosen fields.  Shah’s parents came to the U.S. from India and settled in Gwinnett County where he grew up.

“It is a great privilege to join the Soros community,” said Shah.  “The foundation strives to identify and bring together students whose experiences as a first- or second-generation immigrant have influenced their aspirations.  I look forward to working with these like-minded individuals to improve our nation’s health care system as a future physician policymaker.”

“I am particularly grateful to the University of Georgia for its support during the application process,” he added. “The Honors Program provided valuable guidance throughout the period and organized mock interviews.  It is highly unusual for an undergraduate institution to offer this level of assistance to alumni.  We should celebrate this special relationship that our university fosters with its students.”

Carl Vinson Institute of Government Names New Fellows

Four UGA Honors students began work with the Institute in January as interns in the Vinson Institute Fellows Program. During the spring semester, Elizabeth Allan, Catherine Mencher, Shayna Pollock, and Matthew Sellers will assist faculty-mentors with the hands-on study, research, and outreach of the Institute.

The Vinson Institute developed the Fellows Program in order to involve high-achieving undergraduate students in its work. The program offers the students perspective into careers in public service. Students also gain valuable, real world experience working with and studying local and state governments.

For the selection of this semester’s class of interns, the Fellows Program, in cooperation with the university’s Honors Program, developed a partnership with the UGA chapter of the Roosevelt Institution, a nationwide network of student think tanks.
Read the full article...

Honors Alumna Katie Owers Awarded European Union Scholarship

Katharine Owers, who was recognized with a Goldwater Honorable Mention as a UGA undergraduate, has received an internationally competitive Erasmus Mundus Scholarship to pursue a master’s program in evolutionary biology. The program, funded by the European Union, is a joint venture between Harvard and universities in Germany, Sweden, France and the Netherlands. Owers will begin her studies at one of these universities and spend at least one semester at a partner university during the two-year program that accepts only two people per country.

An Honors student at UGA, Owers was a Presidential Scholar and Dean’s Scholar and was involved in community service through Circle K International and the Salvation Army. She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology in 2008. Now working with Georgia’s endangered freshwater fish and mussels through an internship with the Department of Natural Resources, she would like to pursue a research and teaching career in evolutionary biology.

For more information, visit the MEME site.

Honors Student Receives George J. Mitchell Postgraduate Scholarship

For the second consecutive year, a University of Georgia undergraduate is among the nationally selected recipients of the George J. Mitchell Postgraduate Scholarship. Stephen Dorner, an Honors student from Alpharetta, will use his fellowship to earn a master’s degree in global health at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland during the 2010-2011 academic year.

Dorner, who is one of nine Mitchell Scholars announced Nov. 23, will graduate in spring 2010 with a bachelor’s degree in microbiology from UGA’s Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and a bachelor’s degree in environmental health from UGA’s College of Public Health. Dorner was selected from a pool of almost 300 applicants from more than 150 colleges and universities across the U.S. He is the second UGA student to receive the award. Christina Faust, who graduated in May 2009 with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in ecology, was the first recipient last year and among the 10th anniversary class of Mitchell Scholars. The Mitchell Scholarship, sponsored by the U.S.-Ireland Alliance, is a competitive one-year post-graduate fellowship for any discipline offered by institutions in Ireland and Northern Ireland. The award is named in honor of George J. Mitchell, the former U.S. senator who served as chairman of the historic peace negotiations in Northern Ireland. The Mitchell Scholars Program provides tuition, housing, a living expenses stipend, and an international travel stipend. Read more...

Foundation Fellow Alumna Mindy Lipsitz featured in b-metro magazine

Mindy Lipsitz, a Foundation Fellow alumna ('08), was recently featured in Birmingham's b-metro magazine's cover story, "Woman Without Borders." "With a unique combination of ambition, selflessness and youth, UAB medical student Mindy Lipsitz sets out to change the world, one village at a time." Read the full article...

Honors student receives Running Start/Wal-Mart Star Fellowship

Honors undergraduate Jill Turner is one of seven young women recently selected nationally for the Running Start/Wal-Mart Star Fellowship Program, a new initiative of Running Start, a nonprofit organization that aims to educate and inspire young women to pursue leadership roles in public service careers. In spring 2010, Turner will intern in the office of a female legislator in Washington, D.C. Turner, who is from Tyrone, is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in international affairs at UGA.Through a joint venture between UGA’s Honors Program and School of Public and International Affairs, Turner is also taking graduate courses in public administration and plans to complete the master’s degree program in public administration by the time she finishes her undergraduate coursework in spring 2011. Read more...

Ramsey Scholar Named AP State Scholar for Tennessee

Camille Gregory (’13), a first-year Ramsey Honors Scholar, was selected as Tennessee’s AP State Scholar. The award is granted to the one male and one female student in each U.S. state with scores of 3 or higher on the greatest number of AP Exams, and then the highest average score (at least 3.5) on all AP Exams taken.

Record number of UGA students receive Fulbright Awards for 2009-2010

Ten University of Georgia students have been selected to receive scholarships from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program for research, study, or teaching abroad during the 2009-2010 academic year.

“The record number of Fulbright grants awarded this year is a testament to our students’ exceptional academic talent, ingenuity, and dedication to service, and is further proof that UGA stands as a leader in international education,” said Maria de Rocher, campus Fulbright U.S. Student Program advisor and program coordinator in the Honors Program.

The English Teaching Assistantship Grant awardees, who will serve as language-learning assistants in schools or universities, include spring graduates Samantha Haggard of Atlanta, Jason Kim of Martinez, and Kelly Nielsen of Brooklet. The recipients of the U.S. Student Full Grants for study and research opportunities include doctoral students Christine Beitl of Hasbrouck Heights, N.J., David Porcaro of Winterville, Julie Rushmore of Alpharetta, and Desiree Seponski of Statham, plus Robert Kazer of Roswell, who earned a bachelor’s degree in the spring. Read more...

Foundation Fellow Alumna Beth Shapiro wins McArthur foundation "Genius award"

University of Georgia alumna Beth Shapiro (BS ’99, MS ’99), a Rhodes Scholar who is currently Shaffer Career Development assistant professor of biology at Penn State, has been selected as one of 24 MacArthur Fellows by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. The prestigious award is given to talented individuals in a variety of fields based on three criteria: exceptional creativity, promise for important future advances based on a track record of significant accomplishment and potential for the fellowship to facilitate subsequent creative work. The fellowship is often referred to as the “Genius Award” and comes with an unrestricted stipend of $500,000 to the recipient, paid out in equal quarterly installments over five years.

Shapiro received both her master’s and bachelor’s degrees in ecology from UGA in 1999. She earned a doctoral degree in zoology from Oxford University in 2003.

Shapiro, a native of Lindale, attended UGA as a Foundation Fellow, the university’s most prestigious scholarship program for undergraduate students. The Foundation Fellowship, which is part of the Honors Program, provides full tuition, travel-study grants and research and academic conference support. In 1999, she was one of 32 Rhodes Scholars from the United States and the first female from UGA to receive the award.

Honors Internship Programs accepting applications for DC, New York, and Savannah

Kelsey Jones, who graduates in May with a bachelor’s degree in international affairs and a master’s degree in public administration, worked for the Greater New York Hospital Association for her summer 2009 internship. She interned in the Legal, Regulatory and Professional Affairs Department, under UGA alumna Susan C. Waltman, Esq. (AB ‘73, MSW ‘75), and focused on hospital administration and healthcare practices.

“It was fascinating and fulfilling to participate in the development of policies and practices that will have a widespread impact for years to come,” said Jones, who is from Atlanta. “I witnessed the way in which Greater New York works with hospitals, physicians, medical associations and the federal government to uniquely weave together each group’s interest into a solution that is fair and beneficial for all.”

Sophomore Yasmin Yonis, who is from Lawrenceville and pursuing bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and journalism, served as an intern with Voice of America this past summer. At the multimedia international public broadcasting agency, Yonis worked in the division focused on African events and affairs.

“The Honors in D.C. program has helped to provide me with a clearer understanding of how to reach my career goals,” said Yonis, who was born in Somalia. “The opportunities I have been able to take part in have been invaluable. I have gone to the White House to cover human rights protesters, attended Congressional and Senate hearings, conducted television interviews with experts and assisted in the production of TV and radio shows.” Read more...

Jessica Van Parys wins Javits Fellowship and NSF Fellowship for doctoral studies

UGA graduate Jessica Van Parys, who earned combined bachelor’s/master’s degrees in economics and a bachelor’s degree in political science in May, has been awarded a Jacob K. Javits Graduate Fellowship from the U.S. Department of Education and a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Van Parys, who was enrolled in UGA’s Honors Program, is using both fellowships to support her doctoral studies in economics at Columbia University this fall.
“Jessica is very deserving of the national recognition for her research work that these fellowships represent,” said David S. Williams, director of UGA’s Honors Program. “It has been wonderful to watch her growth as a scholar the past few years. Her work is truly exceptional and impressive, and it reflects her creativity and dedication. I expect great things from her in the future.”

The Javits Fellowship Program is named for the late U.S. senator for his support of education and the arts. The fellowship provides financial assistance, up to four years, to academically outstanding students who are pursuing doctoral or M.F.A. studies in selected fields of arts, humanities and social sciences. The three-year NSF Graduate Research Fellowships are awarded to students with superior academic records who are pursuing research-based graduate studies in mathematics, science and engineering. Read more...

Honors students awarded NSEP-Boren Scholarships for language study abroad

Four University of Georgia undergraduates in the Honors Program have been awarded 2009 National Security Education Program David L. Boren Undergraduate Scholarships for language study abroad during the 2009-2010 academic year. Three of the UGA recipients have accepted the award. They are Laura Eaton, who is from Watkinsville, and Daniel Jackson, who is from Marietta, both pursuing bachelor’s degrees in international affairs and Arabic language and literature; and Dan Healy, a senior from Milton, who is studying both international affairs and Chinese language and literature.

“This is the first time that four UGA students have received Boren awards in a single year,” said David S. Williams, director of UGA’s Honors Program and NSEP’s faculty representative at UGA. “They all began their language instruction at UGA and supplemented that with language study abroad. The awards will allow the three students who accepted them further extension of their studies by funding lengthy and immersive experiences. I am very proud of each of the recipients.”

The merit-based NSEP Boren Scholarships were created by the National Security Act of 1991 and named after the legislative author and current University of Oklahoma president David L. Boren. The scholarship, usually for one semester or a full academic year, aims to give recipients the tools and skills to work in fields deemed important to U.S. national security through the study of less commonly taught foreign languages and immersion in those cultures. Read more...