Graduate education at the University of Wisconsin–Madison
A series of online graduate student groups focusing on topics like prelim preparation, the job market, and work-life balance is giving graduate students a chance to connect with others outside of their program and feel a sense of shared experience during a year that many find isolating.
Due to budget challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s minimum stipend rates for graduate assistants and fellows will remain unchanged for the 2021-22 academic year.
Lena Vincent started her career as a graduate student with big questions: How did life begin? Does life exist elsewhere in the universe? “Realizing that you can turn these existential questions that everyone asks themselves into a scientific career was really exciting,” said Vincent, a PhD student in David Baum’s lab at UW–Madison.
Geoscience graduate student Yihang Fang will test whether protein control is the mechanism helping leaf-cutter ants form a layer of mineral "armor" as a fellow at the Smithsonian Institute National Museum of Natural History.
UW–Madison geography PhD candidate Allen Xiao has been awarded a Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Xiao’s dissertation explores how residents of Lagos, Nigeria, tell stories of and relate to their life experiences in the largest city in Africa.
Graduate student Katarina Braun and Gage Moreno's work with sequencing the 2019 novel coronavirus has helped scientists better understand how the virus has traveled in Wisconsin and whether the protective equipment and safety protocols used in local hospitals are effective.
The death of George Floyd has deeply affected all members of our community, especially our Black and Brown students and colleagues. I would like to echo Chancellor Blank’s message, express how moved I was by Deputy Vice Chancellor Sim’s message, and reiterate our institutional commitment to combat racism, hate, and violence.
Art history PhD candidate Fernanda Villarroel has received two national fellowships that support her scholarship exploring the concept of the feminine through historical and contemporary art in Africa.
In her dissertation, anthropology PhD student Sarah Bruno uses bomba as a site and a method for exploring the emotions of Afro-Puerto Rican women on the island of Puerto Rico and throughout its diaspora. She has received a 2020 Mellon/ACLS Dissertation Completion Fellowship for this work.
Mathematicians use algorithms to identify cases of gerrymandering, but even computer-generated results can be biased. PhD student Elle Najt's work aims to identify the signatures of deliberate algorithm manipulation to prevent the extreme excesses of gerrymandering.