Provost’s Award Honors Five IU Students’ Exceptional Undergraduate Projects

The Provost’s Award for Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity seeks to recognize students that have gone above and beyond in their respective fields. The five categories awarded each spring include Performing and Creative Arts, Social and Applied Sciences, Natural and Mathematical Sciences, Professional Inquiry, and Humanities.

These students have been mentored by IU faculty members in their field. Many have found that their mentors played a pivotal role in their success. Provost’s Award recipients receive a certificate commemorating their achievement. Faculty mentors receive a research grant to fund future projects sponsored by the Offices of the Provost, Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education, and Vice Provost for Faculty and academic Affairs.

Destini Ross, a 2021 graduate, has been awarded the Creative and Performing Arts award based on her photography thesis titled Framework and her visual research paper: “On being seen as fully one's own; Visualizing hierarchies of comfort.”

“It is a great honor to be recognized for this work,” said Ross when asked about what the Provost Award means to her, “which is so near to my heart and was guided by two foundational mentors.” Her faculty mentors, Faye Gleisser and Elizabeth Claffey, are from the Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture, and Design. “Both Glessier and Claffey have encouraged me not to need to know everything, but instead to question everything,” said Ross.

She now plans to take the skills she has acquired at IU and through her extensive research to graduate school where she will, “construct a life by searching for questions, rather than answers.”

Receiving this year’s Social and applied Sciences award for his thesis How the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Affects Crime, upcoming senior Jonathan Ralstin is grateful to be a winner. Ralstin’s research experience has led him to consider a graduate program in public policy. He is currently pursuing a degree in economics and math.

His mentor, Professor Coady Wing from the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs, gave him guidance and perspective when conducting his research. “Professor Wing is very enthusiastic about the research process which made it very enjoyable to work with him.”

Double majoring in English and anthropology, Spencer Bures is honored to have been nominated for the Provost’s Award for Undergraduate Research for Humanities by his Professor, Jennifer Fleissner. Bures commends Professor Fleissner’s “engaged and expansive intellectual inquiry” that inspires him in his work. He hopes to further these inspired interests in graduate school.

Over the last year, Bures worked under Fleissner’s mentorship to research and compose an honors thesis. Inspired by nineteenth-century American writer Kate Chopin, Bures examined “the category of will” in her work. “I have always been drawn to interdisciplinary work that is attuned to both the literary and the sociohistorical dimensions of a text,” said Bures of his inspiration behind his thesis.

Meghan Russell, winner of the Provost’s award for her dedication to microbiology research, began her undergraduate research in the Dr. Julia van Kessel’s lab at Indiana University as a freshman. Her research as an undergrad focused on quorum sensing and understanding the structural basis of this phenomenon.

Russell is grateful for her mentors who she said, “provided her wisdom and comfort through the stinging nuances of being a woman in science.” The supportive environment she was trained in helped her to feel comfortable making mistakes and asking questions.

As a 2021 graduate with a microbiology major and chemistry minor, Russell will now be pursuing an M.D. in infectious diseases. She plans to attend the IU School of Medicine and continue her time as a Hoosier this fall.

Avanti Cheruvallath is a graduating IU senior with a degree in finance, marketing, and professional sales. Her research goal was to help predict how countries at different Gross National Income (GNI) levels might be inclined to regulate disruptive technology in the future. After graduation she plans to work in equity research at Citi Bank in New York City.

Cheruvallatha was inspired by her mentor, Professor Abbey Stemler, to conduct this research based on Professor Stemler’s research in the efficiency of sharing economy regulation and its impact on innovation. “Her mentorship fundamentally changed my college experience,” said Cheruvallatha as she explains all her mentor did for her, including sponsoring her work for a presentation at the Academy for Legal Studies in Business Conference last year.

To learn more about the Provost’s Award and see past winners, visit: https://provost.indiana.edu/about/award-recipients.html