HUGE Congratulations to these WGSS Superstars!

Their impressive accomplishments are truly well deserved. We wish you all the best in the future!

Amber Brown

In addition to joining Pi Alpha Alpha, the global honor society for public affairs and administration, Amber received the first Noah Hookstra Memorial Award as a member of the Dole Institute's Student Advisory Board. The Noah Hookstra Memorial Award aims to honor Noah’s memory by recognizing a student who, in their own unique way, carries forward his legacy of kindness, resilience, and dedication to making the world a better place. And to top it off she passed her qualifying exam for her MPA!

Jessina Emmert

Is a recipient of the prestigious AAUW, American Association of University Women Fellowship for the 2024-2025 academic year. Jessina is a PhD candidate here at KU with a concentration in American Studies and a certificate in African American Studies. With this fellowship she will  focus on her research project “Fancy Movements: Black Women and Performance in New Orleans” which merges Black feminist theoretical frameworks, performance studies and Black digital humanities to examine the intricate layering of the social and physical aspects of Black women’s sense of space and place under New Orleans’ institution of slavery in the 19th century.

Shawna Shipley-Gates

There’s a new doctor in town! Congrats to Shawna Shipley-Gates who successfully defended her dissertation and will now forever be known as Dr. Shipley-Gates.