Undergraduate News

Jose Federico Cohen Freue won the Brett Gosnell Prize for the best essay by a first-year undergraduate.  His essay “Style Concerns in an SEC Filing” was written for Margaret Gardiner’s section of ENWR 110, Accelerated Academic Writing.  Gardiner, a doctoral student in the Department, shares in the award, which was judged by novelist (and Albemarle county resident) John Grisham.

Meredith Jordan won the Rachel St. Paul Poetry Prize for the best group of poems by a University of Virginia undergraduate.

Caranne King was the winner of the Wagenheim Prize for the best short story by an undergraduate English major for her story “Everything That Will Happen Already Has.”

Lansing C. Lee won the Wagenheim Prize for the best literary essay by an undergraduate English major for his essay  “Better Together: The Sanctity of Dialogue in Paradise Lost.”

Claire Skinner won the Hannah Kahn Poetry Prize for the best poem by a fourth-year English major for her poem “The Slum Apartments.”

At the English Department’s degree ceremony during Final Exercises on May 17, the following English majors were awarded their BA degrees with Distinction:

Shaheen Ali              DISTINCTION

Elizabeth Baxa         HIGH DISTINCTION

Jamie Buonato          DISTINCTION

Nicole Dinion            DISTINCTION

Charlotte Howell        DISTINCTION

Jill Jefferson              DISTINCTION

Mary Beth Lineberry   DISTINCTION

Caroline Mayberger    HIGH DISTINCTION

Janet McIlwain           DISTINCTION

Amber Melton            DISTINCTION

Kristin Millay              DISTINCTION

Evan Monez               DISTINCTION

Jocelyn Spaar            HIGHEST DISTINCTION

Meredith Jordan         DISTINCTION

Lauren Palmer           DISTINCTION

Liz Pettit                   DISTINCTION

Claire Skinner            HIGH DISTINCTION

Finally, the English Department is able to reward a number of our best undergraduate majors with fellowship money each year.  For next year, the following students have been awarded Wagenheim, Pruden, Savage, and Watkins fellowships for the 2009-10 academic year.

Wagenheim Fellowships, awarded to academically exceptional rising fourth year students:

Alexander Gordon Rocca

Virginia Stewart Black

Rebecca Sohee Oh

Caroline Siobhan Ryon

Lucy Jennifer Zhou

Pruden Fellowships, awarded to aademically strong rising fourth year students from VA, NC, TN, or SC, with financial need:

Sarah Caroline Wade

Candace Parnell

Colleen Marie Nichols

Savage Fellowship, awarded to an academically exceptional rising fourth year student with financial need:

Mary Camille Beckman

Watkins Fellowship, awarded to an academically strong rising third year from AL, TN, GA, AK, or MI, with financial need:

Stephanie Marie Newton