The results are in! This year, our students awarded the Honors Excellence in Teaching Award to Frances McCue, Senior Lecturer in the English Department and Honors Writer-in-Residence. Her award was presented during the Honors graduation and scholarship recognition event by Shannon Foss, an Interdisciplinary Honors student pursuing a Comparative History of Ideas degree.

Read Shannon Foss' award speech for Frances McCue »

Fourteen University of Washington students were recently awarded Bonderman Travel Fellowships that will enable them to embark on solo journeys that are at least eight months long and take them to at least two regions and six countries of the world.

While traveling, students may not pursue academic study, projects, or research. Established in 1995, this fellowship aims to expose students to the intrinsic, often life-changing, benefits of international travel. UW graduate students, undergraduate students in the Honors Program and in UW Tacoma's Global Honors Program are eligible to apply.

The 2013 awardees are:

UNDERGRADS:
Nicola Follis - Aquatic and Fishery Science, Dept. Honors
Emily Hsieh - Biochemistry & Biology, College Honors
Stephanie Morriss - Environmental Studies, Interdisciplinary Honors
Catherine Opie - English, Dept. Honors
Kaiwen Sun - Electrical Engineering & Philosophy, Interdisciplinary Honors
Alex Taipale - Biochemistry, Dept. Honors
Kevin Tsuchida - Civil and Environmental Engineering, Interdisciplinary Honors

GRADS:
Karlyn Beer - Molecular and Cellular Biology & Epidemiology, Interdisciplinary MS/PhD
Cori Bucherl - Chemical Engineering, PhD
Katrina Claw - Genome Sciences, PhD
Samantha Halstead - Museology, Masters
Stephanie Liapis - Dance, MFA
Daniel Miller - International Studies, Masters
Daniel Stofleth - Communications, PhD

Learn more about the Bonderman Fellowship and view the Fellow bios

Faustine Dufka, a senior pursuing a degree in anthropology with College Honors, is featured on UW Today for her Honors thesis research.

Dufka investigated remembrance photography as a way to reveal how contemporary families cope with infant death. She interviewed parents, photographers and health care workers and volunteered at the Seattle-based nonprofit Soulumination, which provides free photography services to families with children 18 years old and younger facing life-threatening illnesses.

"Faustine's thesis is medical anthropology at its best," said Daniel Hoffman, a UW associate professor of anthropology and faculty adviser to Dufka's project. "She used careful observation to explore a real problem: How people experience and make sense of a personal tragedy within a larger social and medical context that doesn’t generally honor or assist them in grief."

Read more about Faustine's research at UW Today »

Congratulations to Gennie Gebhart, one of 18 students nationwide to be selected as a Luce Scholar! The Luce Scholars Program is a nationally competitive fellowship program. It was launched by the Henry Luce Foundation in 1974 to enhance the understanding of Asia among potential leaders in American society. The program provides stipends, language training, and individualized professional placement in Asia for 15-18 Luce Scholars each year, and welcomes applications from college seniors, graduate students, and young professionals in a variety of fields who have had limited exposure to Asia.

Gennie's bio, courtesy of the Henry Luce Foundation:

Gennie Gebhart, a Sacramento native and now a proud Seattlite, grew up exploring libraries. Gennie will graduate from the University of Washington in June 2013 with a degree in International Studies and Economics. While her academic studies at the UW have focused on environmental economics and international energy politics, she is aiming to extend these fields of study into a career in information justice and international librarianship.

The UW Libraries have opened countless doors for Gennie, and she owes her current informatics skills and aspirations to them. Having worked at the UW Libraries’ Odegaard Undergraduate Library, the Northwest branch of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine, and the UW’s Media Center (the main multimedia library), Gennie has had hands-on experience in what it takes to keep a university library running from day to day through everything from budget cuts to large-scale renovations.

Gennie’s introduction to the art and study of cinema at the Media Center has led to her current senior Honors thesis on Italian film, which she has been fortunate to undertake in Rome during winter quarter 2013. Her activities in Italy so far have included trips to Naples for Christmas and New Years with strangers-turned-family, trying to fix her apartment’s water heater, and speaking as much Italian as possible.

Gennie’s greatest passion lies in the problem-solving and advocacy she has found as a student representative on the UW’s Library Student Advisory Committee and Faculty Council on University Libraries. In these groups, terms like "open access," "information justice," and "digital commons" have taken on tangible and urgent meaning. Gennie hopes to enter the global open access debate armed with international experience, a multidisciplinary education, and constant mindfulness of the vital human side of digital information technology.

Learn more about the 2013-14 Luce Scholars at the Henry Luce Foundation website »

The University of Washington has announced the freshman, sophomore and junior medalists – the outstanding students in their respective classes – based on academic records for the 2011-12 academic year.

• David A. Jekel: An Interdisciplinary Honors student majoring in mathematics and classics
• Emily Nitz-Ritter: An Interdisciplinary Honors student majoring in English and CHID (comparative history of ideas)
• Eric Lei: Entered through the UW Academy and majoring in computer science, economics and mathematics

Congratulations to all!

Read the full student bios on UW Today »