Undergraduate Research Leads to "U of L's Own Rhodes" and Other Opportunities

“U of L's own Rhodes” is a reference used by some to identify an extraordinary post-graduate scholarship available to students in the College of Arts and Sciences at U of L.

The reference developed because the funding for the Mary Churchill Humphrey endowed Centenary Memorial Scholarship is comparable to the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship. The Churchill Humphrey, awarded for work demonstrating extraordinary analytical, research and writing skills, provides $25,000 annually toward the cost of transportation, tuition and fees (room and board) for two years of study at any English, Scottish or Irish university.

Like the Rhodes, competition for the Churchill Humphrey Scholarship is intense. The scholarship, which was endowed in the 1940s, is open only to College of Arts & Sciences students who are recent graduates or are graduating. In the fall, U of L named Elizabeth Russell, a 2005 Honors Scholar and summa cum laude history graduate, the Mary Churchill Humphrey Scholar for 2006-08. Runners-up for the scholarship are Natalie Richards and Michele Wilbert.

According to Elizabeth, her Senior Honors Project titled “The Making of Saints: The Impact of Fourteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Historical Context and the Role of Women in the Lives of St. Catherine of Siena and St. Teresa of Ávila” played a pivotal role in focusing both her career interests and her application for the scholarship. “Before beginning my Honors thesis, I had a general idea of the path of my research, which was dependent on my interests in the history of the Medieval European church, but I was unable to focus those interests into anything substantial or worthwhile in the field.”

Her work on the project with Dr. Karen Spierling in the history department challenged her to “think past the assignments I had been given as an undergraduate and to find for myself the research that would prepare me to be competitive in graduate school. Not only did the project define my research interests and abilities, but it also provided me with a piece of scholarship to call my own. My thesis proved to be essential in the research portion of my application for the Mary Churchill Humphrey.”

Undergraduate Research Gives Back

While national and international scholarships and fellowships provide a growing number of students at U of L opportunities for prestigious post-graduate study, every undergraduate student engaging in research -- beginning as early as the freshman year -- finds that it leads to substantial intellectual growth. Undergraduate research can, and frequently does, focus career interests and lead to job opportunities. And, as competition for prestigious scholarships grows, students find that early undergraduate research is an increasingly important factor in obtaining scholarships. Several representative Honors students agreed to share their research experiences.

Since high school I have been interested in nanotechnology. When I came to Speed School, I searched for a professor involved in this field. At this time, I am an undergraduate member of Dr. Mahendra Sunkara's team in his Chemical Vapor Deposition lab. Our lab is conducting leading research in different areas of nanotechnology. As an undergraduate, I have had the same access to the lab as the graduate students and have been able to do the same kind of investigations. I started by helping a graduate student, but now I am able to pursue research on my own. The things I have done include using hot filament and microwave reactors to grow carbon nanotubes and even diamond.

Abigail Heiniger
English and humanities
The Faery and the Beast

Discovering Charlotte Brontë's subtle use of fairy tales in the novel Jane Eyre gave the book a whole new meaning for me. Concepts from Dr. Alan Leidner's Honors seminar "Fairy Tales" and Dr. Tamara Yohannes' "Women's Literature" came together in Jane Eyre and fueled my research paper "The Faery and the Beast." Although this theme often goes unnoticed, Brontë used fairy tales to counter sexist Victorian cultural mythology. Jane Eyre's fairy-like qualities are contrasted with those of the Classical goddess. Fairies are active, powerful female characters, while the domestic goddess of Victorian literature is a passive being valued for her temporal beauty. Brontë was able to empower Jane Eyre through fairy tales because the oral tradition of fairy tales was often shaped by women, whereas classical mythology was created and recorded by men alone. This article will be published in 2006 in Brontë Studies.

At left, David Soleimani-Meigooni, a Grawemeyer Scholar who presented his research at the National Collegiate Honors Council conference in St. Louis in late October, pictured with fellow Grawemeyer Scholar Josh Yuen.