91精选

Five 91精选 students have been named recipients of the prestigious Maurice VanderVelde Junior Scholarship Awards for 2019-20. These scholarships support outstanding junior or senior students in collaborative research with a 91精选 professor in their chosen disciplines.聽 Serving as a colleague, not as a paid assistant, each Junior Scholar produces a scholarly product for publication or presentation.

The finalists for 2019-20 are:

• Emily Homman 鈥� Dr. Abbie Schrotenboer (Biology) 鈥� Tracking Water Quality from Smaller Streams to Urban Waterways
• Laura DeVries 鈥� Dr. Clay Carlson (Biology) 鈥� Gut Microbes and Brain Genes
• James Beyer & Ross Barz 鈥� Dr. Michael Bosscher and Dr. Jon VanderWoude (Chemistry) – Fluorescent Protein Lanthanide Binding Affinity

鈥淭hese projects are important because they demonstrate student and professorial attention to their topics鈥� relevance in our time and place,鈥� said Professor of Communication Arts Craig Mattson, Ph.D., co-director of the Honors Program. 鈥淓mily鈥檚 project, for example, along with James鈥檚 and Ross鈥檚 proposed research suggests a close attention to ecological concerns.聽 聽Laura鈥檚 project builds on past VanderVelde scholars鈥� work as well as her own assiduous data-gathering with Dr. Carlson regarding deficits in microbiota.鈥�

Said Assistant Professor of Sociology Lenore Knight Johnson, Ph.D., co-director of the Honors Program, 鈥淭hese scholars are ambitiously and realistically laying out projects that require their best efforts and their hard-won competencies as researchers. Their clear focus, their articulateness, and their commitment to collaborative research enact values deeply held in our community.鈥�

As a community committed to scholarship, the VanderVelde Junior Scholars award helps make possible collaborative research between faculty and students that strengthens and extends our communal concentration on God鈥檚 word and God鈥檚 world.