Academic Awards
Table of Contents
SANDY BLACK MEMORIAL AWARD
Joshua Bradford Knight ‘08
Anna Seung-ha Nam ‘08
The two winners of the Sandy Black Memorial Award combine the qualities of brilliance and diligence that have characterized previous winners. The first winner, a chemistry major from North Carolina, has maintained an excellent GPA while participating in substantial work-study and community service activities including those at the Little Library, Chemistry Department, and free clinics. The second winner, a chemistry major from Missouri, has maintained a near perfect GPA while participating in numerous activities including Free Clinic of Our Towns, Ada Jenkins After-School Program, Fall and Spring Alternative Spring Breaks, and the Asian Cultural Awareness Association. Because both of you have maintained high scholarship and interests in helping people through a medical career, you, Joshua Bradford Knight and Anna Seung-ha Nam, are named this year’s winners of the Sandy Black Memorial Award in Premedical Studies.
FRANZ BOAS AWARD IN ANTHROPOLOGY
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(r-l) Ariel Bugosh ’07 with Professor of Anthropology Nancy Fairley. |
Ariel Theresa Bugosh ‘07
The pioneer anthropologist Franz Boas is remembered not only for his intellectual curiosity and encyclopedic scholarship, but also for his humanitarian concerns and his commitment to intercultural understanding. This year we present the award to Ariel Theresa Bugosh, a student whose academic achievements, broad anthropological experience, and service to others make her an outstanding exemplar of the ideals of our discipline.
BREMER GERMAN LANGUAGE AWARD
James Christian McCain ‘07
The Bremer German Language Award, named in honor of C. Christopher Bremer, M.D., Class of 1960, is awarded this year to the student of German language and culture who best exemplifies a dedicated search for knowledge about German culture, a curiosity about the workings of the poetic word on the page, and a clear understanding of what’s at stake for students of the modern condition. His careful and insightful readings of Kafka, Rilke, and Sebald make clear that the Bremer German Language Award this year goes to James Christian McCain.
TOM DAGGY BIOLOGY AWARD
Kristen Kimberly Cecala ‘07
The recipient of this year’s Tom Daggy award has distinguished herself in the classroom, through service, and by her impressive research. Although often leaving her covered in mud, her devotion to quality research has resulted in several significant projects, one of which is already accepted for publication. Among other awards, she has recently been awarded a prestigious National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. For her enthusiastic love of learning and excellence in research, Kristen Kimberly Cecala is this year’s recipient of the Tom Daggy award.
THE SIGMA XI BIOLOGY RESEARCH AWARD
Leigh Anne Harden ‘07
Annually the Department acknowledges the most distinctive attainments by students performing research in Biology. For the range, commitment, excellence, and obvious joy in their work, this year’s award goes to Leigh Anne Harden.
ALBERTA SMITH DEVANE RELIGION AWARD
Elizabeth Jeanne Ireland ‘07
With this award, the Religion Department recognizes Elizabeth Jeanne Ireland for her consistently careful and imaginative work in her religion courses and for her active involvement, throughout her time at Davidson, in the religious life of the college, the town, and the church more broadly.
W. E. B. DU BOIS AWARD
Lisa Ann VanderGriend ‘07
The W. E. B. Du Bois Award is presented to the best Sociology major with intellectual maturity, determination, and a command of sociological theories and research. This year's recipient, by her conscientious efforts in the field, at the computer, and in professional presentations, has shown that a sociological understanding is necessary in order to gain a greater understanding of how individual prisoners are affected by the social attachments they develop in faith-based programs. Her thesis project entitled, "Within and Beyond the Walls: Inmates’ and Volunteers’ Perspectives of Faith-Based Programs" is an outstanding example of sociological research. The Department of Sociology names Lisa Ann VanderGriend the 2007 W. E. B. Du Bois award winner.
LE PRIX DE FRANÇAIS (FRENCH PRIZE)
Rachel Carter Veto ‘07
The French Department is pleased to award the Prix de Français to a student with broad interests, excellent oral and written skills in French, and significant contribution in all her advanced French courses. Also because of her enthusiastic participation in our program in Tours, her invaluable help as an assistant in the Writing Center, and the Honors thesis she is currently preparing on cathedrals and churches in French Literature, the 2007 Prix de Français goes to Rachel Carter Veto.
MUNDO HISPÁNICO (THE SPANISH AWARD)
Molly Ann McQuillen ‘07
For her excellence as a student and researcher, for her contribution to the Spanish Department, and for her willingness to help her fellow human beings, the Faculty of the Spanish Department selects Molly Ann McQuillen as the recipient of the 2007 Mundo Hispánico Award.
DOUGLAS HOUCHENS STUDIO ART AWARD
Catherine Ann Kennedy ‘08
Life sometimes has pattern, and pattern sometimes has life. It certainly does in the hands of Cate Kennedy. Because your boldly colored canvases carry on in the tradition of Matisse and the Nabis, and because you are the junior art major who has made the most progress during the year, we award you, Catherine Ann Kennedy, the Douglas Houchens Studio Art Award.
DAVID HALBERT HOWARD, JR. CHEMISTRY AWARD
Anna Seung-ha Nam ‘08
The David Halbert Howard, Jr. Chemistry Award is given annually to a rising senior who demonstrates the greatest potential for significant contributions in the field of chemistry. It is with great pleasure that the Chemistry Department presents the Howard Chemistry Award to Anna Seung-ha Nam.
LUCILE AND MAX JACKSON AWARD IN ART HISTORY
Sophia York Meyers ‘08
For her demonstrated passion for visual culture and her disciplined pursuit of the life of the mind and the mind's eye, we are very pleased to announce that this year's Lucile and Max Jackson Award in Art History goes to Sophia York Meyers.
THE KEISER PRIZE IN ENGLISH
Stephen Henry Kaliski ‘07
The Keiser Prize in English, awarded each year for excellence in classical performance, goes this year to senior English major Steve Henry Kaliski. Steve performed King Henry IV and Twelfth Night’s Antonio in last year’s production of For Every Passion Something, presented both on campus in February of 2006 and at the Edinburgh Fringe Drama Festival last August. As the duke of Vienna in the recent Measure for Measure, Stevebeguiled his audiences with the play’s challenging language and his interpretation of Shakespeare’s "duke of dark corners" as a playful student of human nature. To round out his study of Measure for Measure, Steve has just completed a creative senior honors thesis, which adapts Shakespeare’s play in novella form.
KENDRICK KELLEY AWARD IN HISTORY
Lee Thomson Barrow ‘07
The Kelley Award is part of the Kendrick K. Kelley Program in Historical Studies, established in memory of Ken Kelley, a 1963 honors graduate in history who was killed in Vietnam in 1968.
For his participation in the year-long seminar of the Kelley Program, and for his inferential and persuasive thesis examining the roles of Hawaiian leaders during the early years of contact with Westerners, in which he seeks to understand the Hawaiians as actors working to buttress their own power in a shifting domestic context, not merely as buffeted people reacting to foreign influences, the Department of History is pleased to name Lee Thomson Barrow winner of the 2006-2007 Kelley Award.
HENRY T. LILLY AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE IN ENGLISH
Stephen Henry Kaliski ‘07
The Henry T. Lilly Award in English recognizes excellence on the part of a senior English major. This year, the award goes to a student who has excelled in and received awards for both creative writing and literary criticism. We honor Steve Henry Kaliski for his astute, constructive contributions to class discussions, for his valuable years of service as a writing center tutor, and for his overall commitment to excellence in literature—as a reader, writer, and performer.
WILLIAM G. MCGAVOCK MATHEMATICS AWARD
Timothy Daniel Rankin ‘07
This senior is well-known in the mathematics department for his clever and insightful proofs, as well as his considerable talent in computer science. He has already begun his research career, having established new results in the combinatorics of weakly periodic sequences, and helping to apply multigrid methods in problems arising in brain wave imaging. The Mathematics Department is pleased to present the 2007 William G. McGavock Award for outstanding accomplishment in mathematics to Tim Daniel Rankin.
A. K. PHIFER AWARD IN ECONOMICS
Nancy Liang Haskell ‘08
Kyle Niklas Hynden ‘08
The first of the two winners, Nancy Liang Haskell, has an incomparable work ethic and displays remarkable insights both in class and in out-of-class discussions. She thinks with great precision and depth, and her modest and gentle demeanor belies a very sharp mind. The second winner, Kyle Niklas Hynden, possesses an insatiable desire to learn, and he very nicely keeps the "big picture" in sharp focus while mastering the details. He is passionately committed to his work and is now pursuing international dimensions of that work in Geneva, Switzerland.
PHYSICS AWARD
James Edwin Wells ‘07
For outstanding academic achievement in the study of physics, for original contributions to laboratory research on the atomic physics of photodetachment spectroscopy, for positive leadership among his peers, and for service to the Davidson College Physics Department, the Physics Department presents the 2007 Physics Award to James Edwin Wells.
W. KENDRICK PRITCHETT AWARD IN CLASSICS
Nelon Bryant Kirkland ‘07
The W. Kendrick Pritchett award, named in honor of this member of the Class of 1929, goes to a senior classics major who demonstrates characteristics for which W. Kendrick Pritchett is known: distinguished academic performance, personal integrity, and love of ancient literature, history and archaeology.
In the words of the Archaic Greek poet Archilochus,
Poll’ oid’ alopex, all’ echinos hen mega*
"A fox knows many things, but the hedgehog only one: one good one."
Despite this sage advice, Nelon Bryant Kirkland refuses to be a hedgehog. For your outstanding work in class and on stage, for your service as President of the Honor Council, and for your infectious enthusiasm for all things classical, the department of classics is proud to honor you and name you, Nelon Bryant Kirkland, the 2007 winner of the W. Kendrick Pritchett Award.
J. HARRIS PROCTOR AWARD IN POLITICAL SCIENCE
Taylor McKee Ansley ‘07
This year's recipient of the Proctor Award has been an active participant and keen observer of politics. He has volunteered with the College Democrats and People for the American Way, he has traveled across the country interviewing politicians as a Kemp Scholar, and he is writing a senior honors thesis on the role of new technology in election campaigns. For his work inside and outside the classroom, the 2007 recipient of the Proctor Award is Taylor McKee Ansley.
RICHARD ROSS MEMORIAL MUSIC AWARD
Lee Wilson Ballard ‘07
For his achievements in both the classroom as well as on the stage, for his steady leadership of the Davidson College Symphony Orchestra, and for his sensitive ear for music as well as the musicality of verbal language, the Music Department is pleased to name a student full of bright teleological ideas as the recipient of this year’s Richard Ross Memorial Music Award: Lee Wilson Ballard.
THEATRE AWARD
Amy Jean Trainor ‘07
This year the Davidson Theatre Award honors a graduating senior who has made consistent and exceptional contributions to Davidson's Theatre program over the past four years: Amy Jean Trainor. Amy performed in seven department productions and for the past four years has constantly dedicated her time to the department behind-the-scenes for nearly all of our productions in roles such as: stage manager, light and sound board operators, and construction assistant. We are thrilled to give her this well-deserved award.
PORTER VINSON CHEMISTRY AWARD
Christopher Logan Boswell ‘09
The Porter Vinson Chemistry Award is given annually to a rising junior who shows unusual mastery of the field of chemistry and who has exhibited significant promise for further study. The Chemistry Department is proud to present the Porter Vinson Chemistry Award of 2007 to such a worthy recipient, Christopher Logan Boswell.
WILLIAM VINSON MATHEMATICS AWARD
Kent Curtis Ford ‘09
The Department of Mathematics recognizes sophomore Kent Curtis Ford for his mastery of mathematical course work which shows significant promise for further study. We are pleased to name Kent as the 2007 recipient of the William Vinson Mathematics Award.
DANIEL BLAIN WOODS AWARD
Emily Ashton Rivard ‘08
The winner of the Daniel Blain Woods Award in Premedical Studies is a student that combines the qualities of a good doctor – intelligence, technical skills, and an empathetic heart. The winner is described as kind, warm, mature, compassionate, and energetic. Team player and dedicated scholar are other words that describe her. Because of your strong academic achievement, sense of community, compassion for humanity, and love of medicine, you, Emily Ashton Rivard, are named this year’s winner of the Daniel Blain Woods Memorial Award in Premedical Studies.
WILLIAM GATEWOOD WORKMAN PSYCHOLOGY AWARD
Kathryn Rebecca Byars ‘07
Each year the Psychology Department bestows as its highest award the William Gatewood "Gaty" Workman Award. The award commemorates the standards of excellence demonstrated by Dr. Workman in his professional attainments in Teaching, Research, and Service: to the discipline and profession, and to Davidson College. The 2007 Gaty Workman Award goes to Kathryn Rebecca Byars.
WRITING AWARDS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
VEREEN BELL MEMORIAL AWARD IN CREATIVE WRITING
First Place (Poetry)
Rachel Andoga ’07 - “Murmur”
First Place Tie (Fiction):
Michael Harkins ’09 - “My Gift, the Tragedy”
Suzanne Guarino ’08 - “To My Engagement Night”
R. WINDLEY HALL AWARD FOR FIRST-YEAR WRITING
1st prize: Cristina Wilson ‘10 – “The Girl in the News”
2nd prize: Caroline Wood ‘10 – “Six Poems”
3rd prize: Thomas S. Christy ‘10 – “Cxu Vi Pretas?”
CHARLES LLOYD AWARD FOR NON-FICTION PROSE
1st prize scholarly writing: Laura Broom ’07 – “They Did Dare Much for Her Stake: Emasculating Mina, Re-masculating Jonathan, and Revealing Un-Dead Social Norms in Dracula”
2nd prize scholarly writing: Steve Kaliski ’07 – “Justifying the Ways of Books to Men: The Pamela and Otranto Prefaces”
1st prize creative nonfiction: Sami Jarrah ‘07 – “For a Moment, For a Year”
2nd prize creative nonfiction: Maxine Riley ’07 – “Reflection on San Simeon, or In Xanadu with Kubla Khan”
3rd prize creative nonfiction: Mathew Richardson ‘07 – “Static”
THE SAMUEL D. MALONEY ESSAY PRIZE
Elizabeth Jeanne Ireland ‘07
This award is given for the best student essay concerning any aspect of religious life as it relates to its social, cultural, and/or ethical dimensions. This year’s winner of the Samuel D. Maloney Essay Prize is Elizabeth Jeanne Ireland for her essay “Out of Boundaries, an Inner Mexico: An Analysis of Migrant Ex-Votos.”
THE SIGMA XI PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH AWARD
Travis Anthony Brown ‘07
Leigh Anne Harden ‘07
Annually the Department acknowledges the most distinctive attainments by students performing research in Psychology. For the range, commitment, excellence, and obvious joy in their work, this year’s Sigma Xi Research Award in Psychology goes to Travis Anthony Brown and Leigh Anne Harden.
THE JOHN D. KELTON PSYCHOLOGY AWARD
Brooke Elizabeth Bucholtz ‘07
Jennifer Nicole Felder ‘07
John D. Kelton’s work as teacher, psychologist, and Davidson icon is acknowledged in an award. It is based on excellence and perspective, two of Dr. Kelton’s chief characteristics, in the student’s essay that is the best written in a Senior Capstone course in Psychology. This year’s John D. Kelton Psychology Award winner is shared by Brooke Elizabeth Bucholtz and Jennifer Nicole Felder.
EDWARD L. PALMER PSYCHOLOGY AWARD
Lauren Rebekah Sher ‘07
The Psychology Department at Davidson was recently honored by receiving the American Psychological Association’s inaugural Departmental Award for the Culture of Service in the Psychological Sciences. This award provides impetus and resources to annually celebrate that student who has distinctively served others through Psychology. The Psychology Department has named this award the Edward L. Palmer Psychology Award, commemorating the countless ways in which his life and work have graced others, professionally and personally. The first recipient of the newly established Edward L. Palmer Psychology Award is Lauren Rebekah Sher.
THE WELSH PRIZE IN COMPOSITION
William Paul Winter ‘07
This award is for the best original music composition by a Davidson student. Established in 2006 in honor of Wilmer Hayden Welsh, Composer and Professor of Music from 1963-1991, the 2007 Welsh Prize goes to William Paul Winter.
THE RUFUS HALLMARK WRITING AWARD
Molly Leeanna Barnes ‘09
Alice Mejin Leechor ‘08
Named after the distinguished musicologist Rufus Hallmark, Davidson Class of 1965, this award recognizes the best essay on a musical topic written in the previous year. The 2007 winners are Molly Leeanna Barnes and Alice Mejin Leechor.