Three already accomplished young women received awards recently from the Women’s Society of Washington University (WSWU).
At the society’s annual membership meeting April 17, leaders announced the winners of the Harriet K. Switzer Leadership Award and the Elizabeth Gray Danforth Scholarship.
The Switzer award was presented to Jennifer Head and Melany Lopez; the Danforth scholarship was presented to Margarita Tisza.
The Switzer award is presented to graduating seniors who have made a significant contribution during their undergraduate careers at Washington University in St. Louis and demonstrate the potential for future leadership.
The Danforth scholarship is a full-tuition scholarship awarded annually to an outstanding community college transfer student.
(Credit: Mary Butkus)
Head
Head is majoring in chemical engineering. She has been a top student and received several prestigious scholarships, in addition to her regular and varied involvement in community service.
Perhaps the project that made her stand out most, according to the leadership award committee, was her continued effort to improve conditions for children in Ethiopia.
Through Engineers without Borders, Head decided to work toward providing an adequate water supply for the Mekelle School for the Blind in North Ethiopia. After a campaign to raise awareness and funds, Head and other students along with faculty advisers traveled to the Mekelle School, ultimately repairing the water tower, installing a pump into a well and laying a water distribution network.
While working on this project, Head witnessed the devastating effects that vitamin A shortage has on Ethiopian children, causing blindness and increasing the mortality rate. She now plans to work to fortify local edible oils and flour with vitamin A. Head said she has won a Fulbright scholarship to pursue the vitamin A project and plans to spend nine months in Ethiopa next year doing so.
Head plans a career in global health and expects to pursue a master’s degree of public health in global environmental health at Emory University.
Lopez
Lopez, majoring in biology in Arts & Sciences, plans to become a doctor. During her undergraduate career, she has volunteered more than 2,500 hours with EST, the emergency medical technician student group on campus.
She has been an Annika Rodriguez scholar for four years and also has been a resident adviser.
She worked as a uSTAR (undergraduate student training in academic research) fellow in the cell biology and physiology lab of Associate Professor James Huettner, PhD, and they plan to submit their research results for publication soon.
Lopez was accepted in the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Exceptional Research Opportunities Program and worked last summer with David Clapham, MD, PhD, at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital.
Lopez also has been involved with Global Brigades, a student-run volunteer group that travels to developing countries to provide medical care and other services.
(Credit: Mary Butkus)
Tisza
Danforth scholarship recipient Margarita Tisza is completing her studies at St. Louis Community College-Meramec. She looks forward to pursuing bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting and in business administration at WUSTL.
Tisza has been an accomplished student as well as a student leader. She also works part-time and volunteers as a health care assistant with Paraquad, a nonprofit organization that provides services and advocacy for people with disabilities.
Membership in the Women’s Society is open to women of all ages from all backgrounds; WSWU does not require women to be associated with the university to join its organization.