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2026 Graduate Student Research Day Award Winners Announced

Office of Graduate Studies and Academic Innovation 17 April 2026 1 minute read

A total of 27 graduate students at the University of Nebraska at Kearney presented their scholarly activity Thursday, April 16 at Student Research Day in the form of posters, oral presentations, and writing submissions.

To award those who shared exemplary work, the Office of Graduate Studies & Academic Innovation presented the following awards:

Graduate Writing Award

1st Place: Amelia Rodgers – “Detecting Donne in Dorothy L. Sayers's Busman's Honeymoon”, English
Mentor: Marguerite Tassi

Graduate Oral Presentation

1st Place: Liz Eberspacher – “Form and Experimentation In Krazy Kat and Calvin and Hobbes”, English
Mentor: Susan Honeyman

2nd Place: Amelia Rodgers – “Shaping the Detective Reader: T.S. Eliot and Dorothy L. Sayers on Reader Formation”, English
Mentor: Annarose Steinke

Graduate Poster Presentation

Natural & Physical Sciences

1st Place: Nnamdi Okore – “The Molecular Mechanism Linking a Food Packaging Plasticizer EHDPP to Dyslipidemia”, History
Mentor: Yipeng Sui

Fine Arts & Humanities

1st Place: Logan Osmera – “Campus in Confusion: Kearney State College from 1970-1995”, History,
Mentor: Will Stoutamire

Professional & Applied Studies

Tie 1st Place: Bridgett Jensen – “The Effects of Sleep on the Physical and Mental Well-being of Collegiate Football Athletes.”, Kinesiology & Sports Sciences
Mentor: Kazuma Akehi

Tie 1st Place: Charlotte Okraska – “Ethical Challenges in Counseling: Future Counselors' Approaches to Political Discussions with Clients”, Co-Authors, Kailey Wilcox, Emma Arens, Counseling School Psychology and Family Science
Mentor: Umut Arslan

Thesis Awards

Best Thesis Award in the Natural Sciences 2024-2025

William Frisch - Assessing Habitat Changes in Two Nebraska Sandhills Waterbodies
Melissa Wuellner & Keith Koupal – Biology, Advisors

Best Thesis Award in the Humanities 2024-2025

Kiley Truex - A Comparison of the Relationship Between Campus Writing Centers and Development Writing Programs at Two-and Four-Year Institutions.
Amanda Sladek – English, Advisor

MAGS Thesis Award Winner

2026 recipient of the Midwestern Association of Graduate Schools and ProQuest Distinguished Master Thesis Award in the Biological and Life Sciences.

Sunanda Rajput - Sex Differences in Innate Immune Response Following Peanut Exposure
Joseph Dolence – Biology, Advisor

Graduate Student of the Year

UNK Graduate Student of the Year Award
Kailey Wilcox, Counseling, School Psychology, and Family Science with a degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling