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Home > News & Events > CLA Today Archive > Summer 2003 : Student Awards & Accolades

Student Awards & Accolades

Yolanda Williams (graduate student, African American and African Studies) recently returned from giving six successful concerts of the opera Porgy and Bess in Switzerland.

Zachery Keplinger Coelius (senior, political science and history), recently named to USA Today's “All-USA Academic Team” as one of the nation's top 40 students, was one of seven finalists for the 2003 Howard R. Swearer Student Humanitarian Award. A record-breaking 127 applications were submitted by college and university presidents.

Gerri Brightwell, a Ph.D. student in English who is writing a dissertation on servants in Victorian literature, published Cold Country (Duckworth, London, 2002). Described on the flyleaf as “an assured first novel … [about] the themes of friendship, love, and interdependence that power all human relationships,” it is a picaresque narrative of the journey of two young women from Seattle to Fairbanks.

Chris Barnes was selected from 80 volunteers to receive the “Going Above & Beyond” award from the English Learning Center in Minneapolis, where he completed an internship as part of his introductory course on teaching English as a second language.

Toni Thompson (junior, School of Journalism and Mass Communication [SJMC]) was awarded a prestigious Vance Stickell Internship by the American Advertising Federation. Thompson, an honors student in journalism with a Spanish minor, is the first U of M student to win this honor.

Ching Lo, a senior at St. Paul Central High School, is one of five national winners of the $40,000 Knight-Ridder Minority Scholarship. She plans to enroll in CLA, with early admission to SJMC. Lo is a staff writer for The Hmong Times newspaper, is a member of the National Honor Society and the Hmong Women's Circle, and is active in Fresh Force, a community service group involving St. Paul high school students.

The following CLA students received the 2003 President's Student Leadership and Service Award: Kayla Brinkman, Kim Fortin, Ryan Grimes, Brian Kao, Sada Konkol, Joshua LaBau, Erica Mischnick, Daniela Morales, Gina Nelson, Jessica Nelson, Kate Nelson, Holly Pettman, Emily Rasmusson, Craig Scanlan, Gabriel Schlake, Sarah Stein, Aaron Street, Milo Sybrant, Jody Ward, and Daniel Weiske. Kayla Brinkman, Kate Nelson, and Jody Ward received the 2003 University of Minnesota Alumni Association Student Leadership Award.

Sarah Stein received the 2003 Donald R. Zander Award for Outstanding Student Leadership