The 22nd annual Student Scholar Day occurred on Tuesday, April 18. It’s a full-day, campus-wide celebration of student scholarship, and featured nine oral presentations, seven poster presentations, and a faculty scholar presentation, “Turn it Up? Noise as Sonic Rhetoric,” by Abigail Lambke, Ph.D., associate professor of English.
Student projects often include literature reviews, capstone projects, and independent research studies from the academic year. Typically juniors, seniors, and graduate-level students work with a faculty mentor and apply with an abstract. The mentor then helps students through the application process, including writing a strong abstract.
“Student Scholar Day is an exciting event for the entire campus! Our students have the opportunity to showcase the results of their hard work and academic scholarship through scientific experiments, literature reviews, research, and performances. As experts in their subjects, they make professional presentations from which we all learn,” said Sue Ellen McCalley, Ph.D., Avila professor, and student scholar day committee member.
“Student Scholar Day 2023 was very successful! Students from a variety of disciplines gave presentations, fielded questions from the audience, and impressed us all. Congratulations to all of them!”
Student Scholar Day goals include:
- Promote and encourage student contributions to scholarly activity across the campus
- Recognize and reward outstanding student achievements and scholarly activity
- Promote interdisciplinary academic interaction among students and faculty
- Reinforce the breadth of learning that characterizes a quality formal education
- Support the institution’s educational efforts regarding the importance of communication skills
- Enhance community awareness of the high level of scholarship at Avila University
The winners of this year’s Student Scholar Day include:
Poster Presentations:
- 1st Place – Sydney Gardner, Fear of Negative Evaluation and Emotions After Posting on Instagram
- 2nd Place – Elisa Nunez, Pollination Biology of Giant Blue Sage (Salvia azurea) and its Specialist Pollinator the Blue Sage Bee (Tetraloniella cressoniana) at the Jerry Smith Park in Kansas City, Missouri
- 3rd Place – Amy Hernandez-Luna, The Relationship between Social Media Use and Psychosocial Disorders in Adolescence
Oral Presentations:
- 1st Place – Luul Jeylani, Juveniles Risk to Recidivism: Family Edition
- 2nd Place – Jasmine Beltran, Cognitive Effects and Personality Variables Associated with Lucid Dreaming
- 3rd Place – Payton Walter, “…warn the rest of the sisters to raise the wind…” Gender and Witch Trials in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Scotland
Mission Award:
- Mollee Flores, Honoring Identity and Intersectionality through SMART Recovery
Congratulations to the award winners and each student who participated in this unique Avila tradition.
