During the 2008-2009 academic year, 36 Hobart and William Smith students successfully completed Honors projects.  This is the largest number of students completing honors since 2000.  They were recognized, along with their advisers, at a Porch Party given by Provost and Dean of Faculty Teresa Amott.  Their accomplishments were also noted in this year’s Commencement program.

The Hobart and William Smith Honors Program allows students to complete work at the most sustained and sophisticated level available in the Colleges’ curriculum.  Qualified students take two or three self-designed courses that concentrate on the same project and are guided throughout their exploration by a faculty adviser.

In addition to the culminating Honors project, usually a research or critical paper or its counterpart in the creative arts is produced. Each Honors candidate also takes a written examination in their Honors field and an oral examination that covers both the Honors project and the written examination.

Receiving Honors this year are:

Sarah E. Allen, Geoscience

Paleobotany:  A Florule from the Base of the Hell Creek Formation in the Type Area of Eastern Montana:  Implications for Diversity, Climate and Environment

Nan Arens, Adviser

Alison H. Art, Psychology

Increasing Stamina to Combat Racial Anxiety in Interracial Interactions

Jonathan Iuzzini, Adviser

Marisa A. Athas, Sociology

Women in the Military:  Breaking Down the Barriers to Get into the Barracks

Jack Harris, Adviser

Tara A. Gentile, Psychology

Individual Differences in Empathic Accuracy:  Personality and Romantic Relationships

Jonathan Iuzzini, Adviser

Bradley P. Gordon, American Studies

Access and Education:  Retaining Vermont’s Human Capital and Social Integrity Through Higher Education

Jack Harris, Adviser

Ross W. Green, Public Policy

Health Care Trauma:  Can We Solve the Health Care Crisis?

Craig Rimmerman, Adviser

Alicia H. Gregory, English

With:  Elegies

Lauren K. Alleyne, Adviser

Alexandra E. Haseotes, Psychology

All Girls:  The Effect of Academic Environment on the Values of High School Females

Ron Gerrard, Adviser

Sara B. Henegan, Africana Studies

It Ain’t Necessarily So:  The Post-Racial Myth in the Age of Obama

Thelma Pinto, Adviser

Kimberly A. Hlavac. Chemistry

Toward a Solid-Phase Protocol for the Synthesis of Potential Anticancer Agents  Spiruchostatin A-D

Justin S. Miller, Adviser

Courtney A. Jones, Studio Art

The Aesthetic of the Sublime:  An Investigation of Formal Beauty and  Energetic Violence Through Mixed Media Painting

Nicholas Ruth, Adviser

Kathryn A. Klutts, Economics

Increasing Profits is Not Enough:  An Analysis of the Role of Society in Guiding Corporate Social Responsibility

Christopher Gunn, Adviser

Kathryn N. Lawton, History

The New York City Draft Riots and Class:  Public and Governmental Interpretations

Laura Free, Adviser

Katherine C. Marshall, Psychology

The Kindergarten Literacy Initiative Project:  A Look into the Factors Associated with Early Literacy of Incoming Kindergarteners

Julie Kingery, Adviser

Bailey A. Meeker, Mathematics

A Mathematical Model of Celiac Disease

Jonathan Forde, Adviser

Oliver H. Meeker, Sociology

One Viet Nam – Post War Memories and Future Aspirations

Jack D. Harris, Adviser

Samantha B. Miller, Sociology

Alcohol Use, Sexual Decision Making, and Perceived Stigma Among College Women

H. Wesley Perkins, Adviser

Galina Mukomolova, English:  Creative Writing

Kin

David Weiss, Adviser

Isabel A. Olson, Chemistry

Heterogeneous Reactions:  Measuring the Rates of Reaction of Indium-Mediated Allylations

Walter Bowyer, Adviser

Moira P. O’Neill, History

Poison, Sorcery, and Power in the Court of the Sun King

Matthew Kadane, Adviser

Katherine Parker-Magyar, English

Dying is an Art, Like Everything Else:  The Role of Suicide in American Poetry

Karl Parker, Adviser

Megan A. Peterson, History

Gendered Paths to Power?: Women, Privilege, and Politics in Two African Contexts

Abou B. Bamba, Adviser

Tyson R. Reuter, Psychology

Friendship Quality and Adjustment in College Students

Julie Kingery, Adviser

Danielle M. Ryan, Writing and Rhetoric

Reading to Learn, Learning to Read:  An Interdisciplinary Model for Education in Response to the No Child Left Behind Act

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Paula M. Schneider, Studio Art

Strings of Power:  Marionettes and the Mutilation of the Female Body

Nicholas Ruth, Adviser

Jennie A. Seidewand, Individual Major (Art and Social Change)

Keep Your Coins, I Want Change:”  An Art Activist Explores Public Peace Protest Art

Betty Bayer, Adviser

Emily K. Sheehan, English

INKLINGS

Karl Parker, Adviser

Christopher J. Slaby, Art History

Rewriting Yuan Politics:  The Blue-Green Landscapes of Qian Xuan

Lara C.W. Blanchard, Adviser

Kristin L. Stascavage, Writing and Rhetoric

A Case Study:  An Interdisciplinary Approach to the Analysis of Power

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Peter M. Van Dellon, Political Science

The Greatest Success of the Bush Administration

Paul Passavant, Adviser

Simone E. VerEecke, Studio Art

The Art of Composing Chaos:  An Experiment in Automatism

Michael Bogin, Adviser

Anna Wager, Art History

Within and Beyond Convent Walls:  Nuns, Widows, and Art Patronage in Renaissance Italy

Elena Ciletti, Adviser

Andrew K. Wickenden, English (Creative Writing)

American Friction

David Weiss, Adviser

Sarah J.P. Yoon-Miller, Chemistry

Developing Novel Syntheses of 4-Aryl- and 3,4 -Diaryl-3-Pyrrolin-2-ones Utilizing Suzuki- Miyaura Cross-Coupling Reactions

Erin T. Pelkey, Adviser

Hannah L. Zale, Philosophy

Controlling the “Natural Lottery”:  A Defense of Germline Genetic Engineering for Human Enhancement

Scott Brophy, Adviser

Lauren Zeitler, Latin American Studies

A Renewed Alliance?  United States Immigration Policy and Remittance-Based Development in Latin America

Scott McKinney, Adviser