Graduate Student Service Scholarships

Alexius Lampkin

Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology

Alexius (she/her) is passionate about creating more diverse and inclusive spaces for students who are underrepresented and/or limited in opportunities to pursue STEM research, learning, and careers. Since arriving at UW–Madison, she has served in a variety of positions of service to her program, college, and community. She has supported the Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology program by serving as a graduate student representative on both the steering committee and the recruitment committee. This opportunity has allowed her to talk to students about her experiences and to provide insight into how she navigates her career choices in science while being a voice of change for the students’ needs. Additionally, as a graduate intern for WISCIENCE, she serves as the program coordinator for the Biological Interactions Summer Program and the Research Peer Leaders Program. Through these positions, she works with underrepresented undergraduates from across the U.S. who are interested in pursuing research careers and/or doctoral degrees by providing professional development seminars and community-building activities within the program and by facilitating mentor-mentee relationships. As a graduate student mentor in the BioHouse learning community, she mentors first semester undergraduates interested in biology-based majors through navigating the first semester of college and exploring biological research. Alexius understands the need for positioning herself as mentor for the next generation of STEM scholars and her service to these programs has and will continue to make a lasting impact in the UW–Madison community.

Mark Koranda

Psychology

Mark is a new PhD graduate who studies the brain behavior of talking. His thesis investigates cognitive short-cuts that lead to saying what we don’t mean. His advocacy work is to fill the gap in your assumption that sound is the only way to hear others.

Mark Koranda grew up listening for three. He is a child of deaf adults (CODA), a native translator of Deaf rights. At UW–Madison, he served twice on a cross-disciplinary committee for hiring a researcher in Deaf Studies/Sign Language. He has regularly guest lectured across campus on Deaf culture and American Sign Language. He also served on the Psychology department’s inaugural graduate student Climate and Diversity Committee.

Change begins within. Lately Mark’s passion has been directed at developing self-directed cognitive exercises that foster broader thinking. The primary venue of this project is a new campus journaling club, Skilled Reflection, where students address writing prompts to reconcile contradictions between their ideals and the reality they live in. Mark is currently trying to reconcile the incompatibility between his own ideals and current job prospects.

Haleigh Ortmeier-Clarke

Agronomy

Haleigh Ortmeier-Clarke is a PhD student in the Department of Agronomy with research devoted to increasing the diversity of small grains grown in Wisconsin. As a disabled scientist, her advocacy is fueled by her own experiences both in and outside of academia. Haleigh has been a member of her department’s Climate, Equity, and Diversity Committee since the fall of 2019 and has taken leadership on many initiatives, including organizing and hosting a department retreat, coordinating round table discussions to address graduate student concerns, and administering a building accessibility survey. These efforts have produced actionable steps and measurable impact that are already seen and felt throughout the department. Haleigh recognizes the hidden curriculum within academia that perpetuates systemic barriers for underrepresented students. To combat this, she has worked collaboratively with other students and staff to develop documents such as a field work safety guide to create a safer and more equitable environment for graduate students. Outside of the department, Haleigh is also a mentor for disabled and chronically ill undergraduate students through Chronic Health Allies Mentorship Program (CHAMP). She consistently challenges the status quo and holds space for difficult conversations, making her an ally for her peers and a resource for faculty and staff. Haleigh’s emotional, mental, and physical labor in service to her communities, department, and the university will have an impact long after her time at UW ends.

Maxwell Chibuogwu

Plant Pathology

Maxwell, in addition to his research on silage corn diseases and mycotoxins, is very passionate about leadership, community building, and community development. His community-building efforts have led him to get involved with a few groups and organizations on the UW­–Madison campus. As an international student from Nigeria, a lot of Maxwell’s activities have revolved around helping international students. With International Student Services (ISS), Maxwell is a very active member of the REACH program (a team of cross-cultural speakers who share their culture with communities in Madison). Maxwell has given several talks to a variety of groups of people living, working, or schooling in Wisconsin. In addition to speaking, he currently serves as the student representative in the recruitment committee to employ a couple of engagement staff for the ISS.

As an executive with the Plant Sciences Graduate Student Council, he volunteered to help and support high school students and teachers at a minority and agriculture focused high school (St. Vincent high school) in Milwaukee. In his department, Maxwell is involved with the What’s Eating My Plants (WEMP) program which also performs outreach to local communities. WEMP educates different groups of people about what types of diseases are affecting their plants and crops. Maxwell is also an active member of Mentorship Opportunities in Sciences and Agriculture for Individuals of Color (MOSAIC). Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources and Related Sciences (MANRRS) is also another organization where Maxwell has found a niche and is helping build the UW–Madison chapter.

All these activities he engages in are important to him as they connect him to people from all walks of life. With those connections, he shares life’s experiences and learns from them while building community. Helping people, carrying them along, and making sure they understand what is going on is very key to his life and work. He deeply believes that science for science’s sake may not be very useful. But if we use science to impact and improve the lives of those around us, the world will be better for it. His research focuses on the development of field-based management practices that will minimize toxins in silage corn. He will also explore the biology and epidemiology of Gibberella zeae (Fusarium graminearum) during the colonization of silage corn hybrids that leads to Gibberella ear rot and Gibberella stalk rot.

Adam Beard

Endocrinology and Reproductive Physiology

Adam Beard is a fourth-year PhD candidate in the Endocrinology and Reproductive Physiology (ERP) Graduate Training Program and a Research Assistant in the Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences. His research focuses on using the cow and young calf as a model of ovarian and endocrine function in women and prepubertal girls. The multidisciplinary approach to his research has fostered numerous opportunities for him to serve UW–Madison and the surrounding community. After years of involvement, he currently serves as the Chair of the ERP Graduate Student Committee, where he works alongside his peers, graduate coordinator, and program directors to plan professional development and social events for current students, new-student recruitment efforts, and the program’s Annual Research Symposium. He is also the current Vice President of the Animal Science Graduate Student Association (ASGSA) which strives to build community for research assistants and postdocs that are affiliated with the Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences. Involvement with this organization and department has provided him opportunities to “ag-vocate” for Wisconsin’s dairy industry; a favorite of his being “Cows on the Concourse”. He thanks his parents for raising him and his sisters to be of service to people.

Serena Wisner

Neuroscience Training Program (NTP)

After enjoying her interview weekend with the Neuroscience Training Program (NTP) two years ago, Serena made it her goal to help other interviewing students have the same experience and strengthen the NTP student community. Since joining the NTP in 2020, Serena has most certainly done that. For the past year, Serena has served the NTP community as the Student Chair of the NTP Recruitment Committee and Manager of the NTP Peer Mentoring Program. As manager of Peer Mentoring, she organized the Peer Mentor Kick-off Event, the Peer Mentor Fall Semester Event, the Peer Mentor Winter Semester Event, and Mentor-Mentee Meets which pairs incoming graduate students in the program with more senior students. These events increased collegiality amongst the NTP community and enabled new students to feel welcome within the program. When interview season came around, Serena served as the Student Chair of the NTP Recruitment Committee, spearheading the organization of virtual and in-person networking events, scheduling faculty lab tours, organizing current NTP students to host recruits and hosting networking dinners and city tours. By managing and coordinating three recruitment weekends, two virtual and one in-person, Serena demonstrated exceptional leadership, executive presence, and the rare ability to amicably work with scholars across different career stages. The result was an incredibly successful NTP recruitment. In keeping with her goal of strengthening the NTP community, Serena created a server on the messaging platform Discord that was initially used to share information with recruits, but which later served as a platform to create student social clubs that enhanced teambuilding amongst the NTP students and kept students informed of their colleagues’ accomplishments. Outside of her retina research and NTP commitments, Serena has also participated in NTP community service events, volunteered at outreach events aimed at inspiring young students to love science, and represented the NTP at graduate school fairs.

Emma Lazaroff

Educational Psychology

Emma Lazaroff is dedicated to the Wisconsin Idea, using her research expertise in developmental science and STEM learning to benefit those across the university and in the broader community. She has served as President of the Educational Psychology Student Association, where she organized events that provide social and professional support for graduate students in her department. She has also volunteered as a consultant, project manager, and the Director of Operations at WiSolve Consulting Group, a non-profit organization of UW–Madison graduate students and postdocs that is committed to strengthening the entrepreneurial climate within the university and the Madison community. At WiSolve, Emma conducted market research and grant preparation for individuals inside and outside of the university (across disciplines including education, healthcare, and biotechnology) to help them make data-driven business decisions. As part of the Science Alliance/Morgridge Institute for Research, Emma volunteered at local science fairs and spoke to groups of children statewide about her career path and her research, encouraging them to get involved in STEM. Emma hopes that her service will inspire future generations of historically underrepresented scientists.

Alexandra Barber

Educational Psychology (School Psychology program area)

Alexandra Barber studies culturally responsive mental health supports for racially and ethnically minoritized children and families. Over the last three years, she has led the Educational Psychology department’s Diversity and Inclusion Association (DIA) where she has worked with students, staff, and faculty to create an inclusive academic and professional climate; educated the department through trainings and dialogues aimed at advancing cultural responsiveness and social justice; and advocated for systemic changes to promote equity in and outside of the department. Beyond her work with DIA, Alexandra has served as a student representative on the Educational Psychology’s Diversity Steering Committee and Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) Strategic Planning team. Additionally, as the student co-chair for the School Psychology area’s Practicum Committee, she led a systematic transformation of the School Psychology clinical training sequence. Specifically, the committee worked to incorporate new training activities, didactic content, and resources that focus on building students’ cultural self-awareness and cultural humility. As a former teacher, psychologist, and multiracial woman of color, she recognizes the power of infusing social justice work into mental health care for minoritized people to support individual and community healing. Across her four years in Madison, her work with faculty, staff, students, and clients reflects her steadfast commitment to reimagining how schools care for all youth and families.

Emily Mixon

Geoscience

Emily Mixon (she/her) is a PhD student and National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellow in the Department of Geoscience, where she uses isotope geochemistry to answer questions about the history of our continents. Emily finds joy in building coalitions across career levels to improve geoscience diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) by facilitating data-driven and action-oriented policy changes.

Motivated by community-wide instances of exclusion, burn-out, and minoritization in the broad field of geoscience, Emily co-led the development and implementation of the first Department of Geoscience graduate workplace climate survey in 2019-2020, leading to institutional changes including broad departmental participation in Unlearning Racism in Geoscience (URGE) training and re-allocation of funding to support student-led DEI efforts. The climate survey is now a biennial process that longitudinally tracks workplace climate and evaluates departmental initiatives. In 2021, Emily leveraged the previous survey results to inform her leadership of a Department of Geoscience DEI committee of faculty, staff, and students in drafting a code of conduct.

Supporting an initiative to diversify departmental faculty, Emily served as the graduate student representative on the search committee charged with identifying Geoscience candidates for the Faculty Diversity Initiative Target of Opportunity hiring effort from 2020-2022. In this role, she facilitated interactions between students and visiting candidates and gathered community feedback to improve equity and inclusion in the overall hiring process.

She has also served the UW–Madison community through engagement as a founding member of UW–Madison GeoPath and participation as an advising scholar on the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery “Life as We Don’t Know It” art-science initiative. Emily also engages in community-building work beyond UW–Madison. Her efforts beyond campus include founding an online resource aimed at educating geoscientists about racial justice (GeoReadingForEquity) and advocating for student voices in her role as a student representative for both the inclusive early career network “PetroNet” and the Geological Society of America Geochronology Division.

Alexandra Villa

Geoscience

Alex Villa (she/her/ella) is a graduate researcher in the Department of Geoscience and a College of Letters & Science Advanced Opportunity Fellow (AOF). She has made positive and lasting changes to her department, college, and communities through her leadership and engagement. Alex created a cross-departmental group hosted in Geoscience called GeoPath, aimed at broadening participation through professional development, enhancing social networks, and educating departments on barriers to the retention of students of color. She received a grant through WISELI to recognize women of color, be a part of her department’s research colloquium, and engage in a seminar topic that revolved around diversity, equity, inclusion, and social justice including topics like First-Generation Students and Intersectionality. She was selected as the graduate student representative to find the next Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the 2020-2021 academic year. Alex is now working with Associate Dean DeVon Wilson as the DEI graduate intern where she works with faculty leadership in L&S and is the program coordinator for the AOF community. In the last year, Alex has also been selected to work with Dr. Erika Marín-Spiotta for the HEAL-STEM project funded by the Mellon Foundation. Her work with collaborators was recently accepted as a chapter in a book focused on developing an intersectional praxis in higher education through pedagogy, advising, and mentorship. Alex has been a part of numerous efforts and although she has experienced harm as a first-generation Latina in a predominately white field and community, she continues to speak out against injustices and offer substantial solutions. Through her leadership, service, and fierce advocacy, Alex is transforming the student experience at multiple levels, and in her legacy is inspiring others to empower the next generation.

Ruby Bafu

PhD Candidate in Sociology

During her short time in Madison, Ruby has made a lasting impact in her department, campus, and broader community. As a critical scholar, her research on race, gender, and education has shaped her ability to offer suggestions to her department which, like other departments, is committing itself to improving the experiences of historically marginalized students. Ruby is also the current president and previous social chair of the Black Graduate and Professional Student Association (BGPSA) at UW–Madison. Through her role as president Ruby worked with BGPSA’s executive board to organize general body meetings and several social and academic events. Ruby’s involvement in the BGPSA is instrumental for building community amongst and improving the retention of Black students. Although she does not consider it a service to speak out against racism or emotionally support a friend, Ruby’s unpaid service is particularly notable. Ruby is a Black woman whose emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical health has been harmed by racism and sexism and yet, she has continued to support her community during a pandemic. Her service as an advocate for racial justice within and outside of her department has made a lasting impact.

Talia Cohen

PhD Candidate in Clinical Psychology

Talia (she/her) is passionate about increasing accessibility in higher education. She co-founded and directs the Chronic Health Allies Mentorship Program (CHAMP). CHAMP pairs undergraduate student mentees with chronic pain, chronic illness, and/or disability with graduate student mentors who experience similar challenges. CHAMP establishes a community for its members through one-on-one mentorship support, resources with regards to disclosure and attaining accommodations, optional opportunities for advocacy work on disability inclusion in academia, and group events. In just its first year, CHAMP has paired more than 20 undergraduates with mentors. Talia is also a graduate student member of the psychology department’s Climate & Diversity Committee through which she has contributed to a variety of initiatives including: creating a buddy system for incoming PhD students during the pandemic, forming a social committee to decrease isolation, updating the diversity statement and resources on the psych department website, and administering and analyzing a graduate student climate survey aimed at providing an opportunity for students to anonymously express their concerns about their experiences in the department. Separately, she spearheaded an anti-racism town hall for the clinical psychology area group and took part in the diversity panel for the department’s recruitment day.

Becca Honeyball

PhD Candidate in Horticulture

Becca Honeyball (she/her) is working on fungal research in cranberries. As the 2021 Journal Club Chair, Becca fosters an environment of collegiality for new students, engaging graduate students in scientific, professional, and personal development topics, as well as incorporating this spring’s College of Agricultural & Life Sciences Lunch & Learn series, “Our Shared Future.” Becca is a founding administrator of the Mentorship Opportunities in Science & Agriculture for Individuals of Color (MOSAIC) mentorship network alongside Korede Olugbenle and Jenyne Loarca, working to bring together mentors of color to create a network for BIPOC students in CALS. She serves on the Advising & Mentoring branch of the Horticulture Anti-Racism Working Groups, attending workshops on behalf of the group and bringing back ideas and strategies to use going forward. Becca is currently working with WISCIENCE and the Horticulture Equity & Diversity Committee to develop specialized mentorship training for both her department and MOSAIC. With Korede, Becca is also current co-facilitator of the Plant Science Anti-Racism Coalition (ARC), a weekly sounding board and problem-solving team, where students can bring for discussion any hurdles or issues of bias that they might be facing.

Jenyne Loarca

PhD Candidate in Plant Breeding and Plant Genetics

Jenyne Loarca is passionate about creating spaces that prioritize honesty, safety, and connection. In 2020, she served as the Journal Club Chair for the Plant Sciences Graduate Student Council (PSGSC). She broadened the club’s scope to include discussions on professional development. After the highly public murder of George Floyd (and others), she broadened the space further to serve the changing needs of the community – to provide antiracism education for allies by amplifying the voices of BIPOC antiracism educators. Fellow graduate student and council member, Korede Olugbenle, brought to light the absence of Black faculty in their community, the lack of support in the face of national racial trauma, and the wish for more visibility of BIPOC mentors. Along with Becca Honeyball, the three cofounded the organization MOSAIC (Mentorship Opportunities in Science & Agriculture for Individuals of Color) – a mentorship network in the College of Agricultural & Life Sciences (CALS) for BIPOC researchers, graduate students, and postdocs. It is her hope that readers feel empowered to create safe, honest, antiracist spaces in their own departments, and that any CALS affiliates reading this will join the MOSAIC listserv and attend their community-building Lunch & Discuss events. Jenyne also serves on the Horticulture Equity Diversity Committee and will finish her PhD in Plant Breeding & Plant Genetics in 2021.

David Menendez

PhD Candidate in Psychology

David has served in multiple committees in the psychology department including being a member of the departmental colloquium committee for five years, being the graduate student representative in the climate and diversity committee for two years and being the graduate student representative to the faculty for one year. David is also part of the Department of Psychology workgroup on improving the department’s public messaging around diversity and inclusion. Through these committees, David has facilitated several departmental events such as a Title IX information session tailored for graduate students. David has helped draft several letters from graduate student to the psychology faculty around issues of diversity and inclusion in the department. David has also spoken to several student groups on how to get involved with research at UW–Madison and how to apply to graduate school, including UW–Madison’s Psychology Club, and students at Hispanic serving institution such as Northeastern Illinois University and University of Texas, San Antonio. David has also served as a mentor to many undergraduate students, including those in the PREP, IRES, and PASOS programs (programs designed to mentor students from different groups traditionally underrepresented in academia).

Joshua Mitchell

PhD Candidate in the Integrated Program in Biochemistry

Josh has been a long-standing member of the Graduate Leadership and Development Committee in the Integrated Program in Biochemistry (IPiB), first as an outreach chair and then serving as the chair of the committee. As one of the outreach chairs, Josh designed and hosted biochemical science experiments to demonstrate the incredible science around us, from biofuels to cryoprotectants. As chair, Josh worked to build a strong and resilient community to help support graduate student mental and emotional health. During the pandemic, Josh facilitated and hosted the StoryPiB seminar series, which was designed to foster deep, rich relations amongst the faculty, staff, and students by inviting members of the IPiB community to talk about their life. He also served on the IPiB admissions committee, helping recruit a diverse and talented group of new graduate students to the program. Josh has served as a graduate student representative on the Council on Academic Advising for the past three years. He wants to thank the incredible IPiB graduate students who have supported all this work, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Korede Olugbenle

MS Candidate in Agroecology

Korede is one of the administrative members of Mentorship Opportunities in Science & Agriculture for Individuals of Color (MOSAIC). Korede along with the other administrative members bring together mentors of color to create a mentoring network for BIPOC students in the College of Agricultural & Life Sciences. Korede assists with the formation of beneficial relationships, increasing a sense of community and belonging, and hosting lunch and discussion events.

Molli Pauliot

PhD Candidate in Anthropology

Molli Pauliot is an L&S Advanced Opportunity fellow for the past four years and actively participated as a graduate student facilitator with interviews for the AOF Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion with AOF students in February 2021. Pauliot assisted in meeting with potential Native American graduate student recruits for the Department of Anthropology and the Design Studies department through School of Human Ecology in spring 2020. Pauliot is currently working as a part-time project assistant on the Humanities Education for Anti-racism Literacy in Sciences and Medicine (HEAL-STEMM) project, curating teaching and materials on the history of Indigenous communities and federal land grant policies at UW and Midwestern schools in general. In addition to working in spring 2021 on oral interviews through the Madison Public Library Living History Project-Stories from a Distance by interviewing and sharing the Madison Ho-Chunk community members’ experiences on the Covid-19 pandemic and Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, Pauliot enjoys collaborating with teams at the university and in the Madison community to promote equity, diversity, and inclusion to improve relationships and cultural understandings.

Bryan Rubio Perez

PhD Candidate in Electrical and Computer Engineering

Outside of his scientific research in optical engineering and photonics, Bryan is interested in making education accessible to everyone regardless of race, gender, sexuality, and socioeconomic status. Bryan did not know what a PhD student was until he started his undergraduate education. For this reason, he spends his free time involved with STEM outreach and mentoring. As a McNair Scholars Program alumnus, he continues to support the McNair Scholars Program at UW–Madison by participating in graduate school application workshops and in graduate student panels designed to answer questions undergraduate students have about graduate school. Outside of UW–Madison he is a mentor for the Juventud Program, a program started by the Centro Hispano of Dane County, and through this he provides bilingual academic support and mentorship to Latinx and Spanish-speaking youth. Bryan is also an officer for several student organizations including the Electrical and Computer Engineering Graduate Student Association, the Society for Photonics and Instrumentation Engineering (SPIE)/Optical Society of America (OSA) Student Chapter at UW–Madison, and the Graduate Engineering Research Scholars’ Outreach Committee. Through these organization he has been able to engage with students at all levels by planning seminars, professional development events, community-building events, and STEM educational outreach events for elementary school school-aged students.

Taylor Tai

PhD Candidate in Integrative Biology and Entomology

Taylor Tai is a graduate researcher studying bumble bee ecology in the Integrative Biology and Entomology programs at UW–Madison. Upon experiencing the exclusion and marginalization of non-white voices in her programs here, she co-founded a campus organization dedicated to providing community and social support for underrepresented graduate students in STEM fields. In addition to providing programming through this interdepartmental group, she designed and led a graduate course on coping with white supremacist culture in the academic work environment. Taylor finds joy in creating support networks among graduate students, as she believes there is incredible power in collective action and mutual aid. This philosophy has also led her to organize with the Teaching Assistants’ Association (TAA) for more just and equitable policies at the university level, such as the remission of segregated fees and fair compensation for graduate labor. Other services she has given to UW include coordinating the graduate mentorship program in Integrative Biology and serving on the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) committee in Entomology in order to make these programs more welcoming and supportive of diverse members. She believes work like this is urgent and essential and hopes that in the future it is done by administration and faculty rather than falling on unpaid BIPOC graduate students.

Patricia Tran

PhD Candidate in Freshwater and Marine Sciences

Patricia Tran studies aquatic microbial ecology in lakes. During her time at the UW–Madison, she has been involved in service around the themes of diversity, equity and inclusion, community-building, and mentoring. In the past year, Patricia has co-chaired the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) committee at the Center for Limnology, implementing initiatives such as consistent and transparent progress reporting of DEI initiatives. She also served as a graduate representative for the Center for Ecology and the Environment, where she connected students in the field of ecology across campus by organizing student-centered events. Patricia initiated and organized a cross-departmental research group to facilitate collaboration of Lake Mendota research. She participated as a panelist in the Department of Integrative Biology’s events for undergraduate and prospective graduate students, sharing honest personal experiences that will enable students to make informed decisions. Patricia also co-led a weekly yoga session at the Microbial Sciences Building, which promotes community-building and a break from work for folks in the department. Finally, Patricia has provided meaningful mentoring and research opportunities to undergraduate students of various majors. Patricia hopes that her service can make the campus a more welcoming, inclusive, and safe environment for all.

Claudia Triana

PhD Candidate in Educational Policy Studies

Claudia M. Triana is a scholar of comparative and international education, her research focuses on the inequities of im/migration and education policies, displacement, and resistance. Claudia has supported graduate and undergraduate students in the Educational Policy Studies (EPS) department as a teaching assistant and a graduate student representative. In addition to her academic and research roles, she advocates for minoritized students through her participation in the School of Education’s Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee, and the Dean’s Student Council. She has also served in the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) DEI Change Team and currently for the Center’s Strategic Planning Initiatives. Outside of the university, she challenges the legal and social exclusion of immigrant youth and families, working with community organizations and advocates.