Outstanding Research Award Recipients
Fall 2020 Recipients
Sørina Higgins is a PhD candidate and Presidential Scholar at Baylor University. She also serves as a faculty member at Signum University, online, where she was Chair of the Department of Language and Literature for the past five years. Her latest publication is an academic essay collection on The Inklings and King Arthur(Apocryphile Press, December 2017), winner of the 2018 Mythopoeic Society Inklings Scholarship Award. Her interests include British and Irish Modernism, the Inklings, theatre, and magic; her dissertation-in-progress is tentatively titled From Dramaturgy to Thaumaturgy: Staging Occult Modernism.
Jeff Strietzel is a PhD Candidate in Higher Education Leadership at Baylor University. He has been developing as an administrator, teacher, and higher education scholar for a decade. His administrative roles have included responsibilities in the areas of student activities, residential life, student academic support, assessment, graduate student recruitment, campus tours, enrollment services, and university finance. Jeff has served in representative roles at each of the institutions he has studied and worked. For example, Jeff is a former Baylor GSA president. Jeff is now working as Special Projects Manager in the office of the Chief Academic Officer of Texas State Technical College’s state-wide system. Jeff will be a part-time lecturer at Baylor this fall. He has taught eight courses in student success, leadership, and the culture and organization of higher education. He has also published in the Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice (JSARP), a top journal in his field. His qualitative dissertation centers on how 40 executive-level higher education administrators experienced and navigated an unexpected departure from a job and later found employment in higher education.
Tyler Prochnow is a PhD Candidate and Research Assistant in the Health, Human Performance, and Recreation Department at Baylor University. His research interests include the social dynamics which drive health behavior and public health through the equitable distribution of active play opportunities for all individuals. In his work so far at Baylor, Tyler has published 5 scientific articles as first author and has contributed to 9 others as a co-author. He has also contributed to over 45 national and international conference presentations, developed and led a conference workshop, co-authored a Baylor URC funded research project, and has participated in fellowship programs sponsored by NIH, NCI, and CDC. Recently, Tyler was acknowledged as a “Student Who Rocked Public Health in 2019” by the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice.
Fall 2019 Recipients:
Rachel Renbarger, Educational Psychology
Rebekah Burket, Environmental Science
Samantha Hodges, Institute of Biomedical Studies