WKU News

The Office of Scholar Development (OSD) has awarded 13 WKU students a total of $19,894 in Lifetime Experience Grants in the 2013-14 academic year.

The Lifetime Experience (LTE) Grant program was made possible with funding from the WKU Sisterhood, John and Jacque Hughes Jarve, the Office of Scholar Development, the Honors College at WKU and the Office of International Programs.

The awards are designed to enhance students’ competitiveness for national scholarships by supporting research, international study, creative activities, student-designed service, or other scholarly activities.

“The most successful applicants for nationally competitive awards like the Truman and Rhodes scholarships go above and beyond excellent classroom performance, developing and leading programs in their communities or abroad; completing multiple international engagement experiences; and pursuing research in their discipline,” said Dr. Audra Jennings, Director of OSD. “Our LTE program makes these activities possible not only by providing funding for the most promising projects but also by encouraging recipients to apply for nationally competitive awards.”

As a condition of their awards, recipients of LTE grants work closely with OSD staff to apply for several nationally competitive scholarships relevant to their academic disciplines, interests and goals. The pairing of strategic funding and intensive advising has paid off. In summer 2013, Jon Hendrie, a 2014 graduate in biochemistry from Elizabethtown, used his LTE grant to support participation in a research internship in Germany. He has since been awarded a DAAD Study Grant and U.S. Student Fulbright Grant to continue his research in Germany during the 2014-15 academic year. Elizabeth Gribbins, a senior French and political science double major from Louisville, used her LTE grant to conduct research while studying in Morocco and has since been awarded a Department of State Critical Language Scholarship to study Arabic in Summer 2014. OSD staff expect great things from the 2013-14 awardees.

The 2013-14 awardees are:

• Alex Aguirre, a visual arts major from Bowling Green, will use his LTE Grant to study visual, artistic, and linguistic communication in Korea.
• Brooke Barber, an agriculture major from Franklin, will use her LTE Grant to study rock mice, tree squirrels, and acacia rats’ influence on seed dispersal and destruction of ecologically and economically important tree species in South Africa.
• Heather Byerly, an anthropology major from Bowling Green, will use her LTE Grant to study how using oxygen-18 Isotopes from horses can determine distances traveled for ritual activities during the Bronze and Iron Age in Western and Central Mongolia.
• Hannah Garland, an international affairs and Asian religions and cultures major from Somerset, will use her LTE Grant to intern, live, and study in Taipei, Taiwan.
• Alexandra Hezik, a self-designed sustainable agriculture and Asian religions and cultures major from Campbellsville, will use her LTE Grant to fund her research trip with the Fort Worth Zoo conservation expedition to the British Virgin Islands.
• Paige Huzyak, a chemistry major from Bowling Green, will use her LTE Grant to study synthesizing organic materials for better thermoelectric devices.
• Elias Kleinsmith, a film and Spanish major from Louisville, will use his LTE Grant to produce an experimental short film.
• Dare Norman, a performing arts major from Bowling Green, will use her LTE Grant to fund travel to New York City and Beijing to conduct research on American and Chinese performing arts styles.
• Elizabeth Oates, a biology major from Central City, will use her LTE Grant to study the creation of constructs capable of over-expressing different domains of a novel basement membrane degrader in Drosophila melanogaster.
• Emily Potter, an interdisciplinary studies major from Bowling Green, will use her LTE Grant to study how we look at art in our communities.
• Dale Rose, a graduate student in folk studies from Bowling Green, will use his LTE Grant to study the Mission De L’Espirit Saint, a Quebecois denomination.
• Megan Skaggs, an English literature and international affairs major from Brownsville, will use her LTE Grant to explore education in Guatemala.
• Mckinze Vowels, a psychology major from Mount Washington, will use her LTE Grant to research improvements in self-efficacy among nursing home residents after participation in an exercise and health literacy activity.

The WKU Sisterhood, chaired by Julie Ransdell and Kristen Miller, is an organization of women advancing WKU priorities through philanthropic engagement and a collective voice. Since 2010 the Sisterhood has held an annual competition for units and programs affiliated with WKU to receive up to $40,000 in funding for high-impact projects. The Office of Scholar Development’s LTE program was awarded the grant in Fall 2012.

About the Office of Scholar Development: The OSD works with students and their mentors to build research and creative agendas, helps students identify appropriate national and international scholarship opportunities, and provides intensive writing support throughout the application process. OSD staff welcome the opportunity to speak with students about nationally competitive scholarships. Contact: Audra Jennings, (270) 745-5043.

Contact: Audra Jennings, (270) 745-5043.