During the 2010-2011 academic year, 27 Hobart and William Smith students successfully completed Honors projects.  They were recognized, along with their advisers, at a Porch Party given by Provost and Dean of Faculty Teresa Amott on Friday, May 6. Their accomplishments will also be 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, each Honors candidate 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:

Emily Anatole, Writing and Rhetoric

Media by the Minute:  An Entertainment News Site About Trends, Technology and Society

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Joel S. Andruski, Economics

Applying Risk Assessment to an Electricity Cost Model

Thomas Drennen, Adviser

Alexandra G. Aquadro, Architectural Studies

Drawing as a Way of Seeing:  A Study of South Main Street, Geneva, New York

Stanley Mathews, Adviser

Cameron M. Avelis, Individual Major (Biophysics)

Advanced Methods for Protein Simulation

Alan van Giessen, Adviser

Caitlin M. Baker, Anthropology

Creativity and the Culture of Developmental Disabilities

Brenda Maiale, Adviser

Martha A. Beltz, Public Policy

Educational Equity and No Child Left Behind:  The Impact of Policy on Education Reform

Cerri Banks, Adviser

Meghan J. Bowden, Political Science

The Truth of the Matter:  The Practice of Truth-Telling As A Site For Constituting Liberal Democratic Subjects and Community

Paul Passavant, Adviser

Sarah Canavan, Writing and Rhetoric

A Friend, Indeed:  A Teenager’s Guide to Facing Serious Illness in Friends and Peers

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Eleanor M. Chandler, Political Science

Complexity:  An Emerging Discourse that Bridges the Natural and Social Sciences

Jodi Dean, Adviser

Sharlene Diamond, Africana Studies

Dancehall Kings and Queens:  ‘Profiling’ Gender in Jamaican Dancehall Culture

Marilyn Jimënez, Adviser

Michael J. Doane, Psychology

Religion and Health:  A Study Among Students in the Republic of Ireland

Portia Dyrenforth, Adviser

Eleanor C. Eckerson, Women’s Studies

Feminism at the Founding:  An Exploration of ‘Feminism’ and the Emergence of Women’s Shelters in the 1970s

Betty Bayer, Adviser       

Hillary L. Framson, Biology

Is Attachment Required for Necrosis and HR Induction in Agrobacterium vitis?

Sigrid Carle, Adviser

Jessica G. Greger, Chemistry  

The Preparation of 3,4-Diaryl-3-pyrrolin-2-ones and Precursors of Staurosporinone Through Pyrrole Weinreb Amide Intermediates

Erin Pelkey, Adviser

Kara E. Grogan, History

The Politics of Memory in Berlin After 1945

Clifton Hood, Adviser

Neala R. Havener, Writing and Rhetoric

Food Poor, Poor Food:  Three Voices of the National School Lunch Program

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Christina S. Jenkins, Writing and Rhetoric

The Dark Fate:  Book One of The Dark Awakening Trilogy

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Reynaldo  Kelly, Computer Science

Aerial Sensor Platform:  Design, Control, and Implementation

John Vaughn, Adviser

Zachary C. Kimes, Political Science

Politics and Memory:  Revolutionary Organization from Lenin to Hardt and Negri

Jodi Dean, Adviser

Whitman Littlefield, English

“With Whom We Stand: A Search for Place”

Anna Creadick, Adviser

Emma J. Luton, Women’s Studies

“Something for the Girls” –  Girl Scouts’ Subversive Role in Female-Centered Activist Communities

Betty Bayer, Adviser

Amy  Nimon, Writing and Rhetoric

Tiny Adventures and the Roads Less Traveled

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Lisa E. Philippone, Anthropology

Culture Drought:  Water Scarcity in Rural Rajasthan

Brenda Maiale, Adviser

Shelby  Pierce, International Relations   (junior-graduating next year)

Language From the Barrel of a A Gun:  Understanding the Lord’s Resistance Army Beyond the Western Press

Kevin Dunn, Adviser

Megan Rechin, Individual Major (Science Journalism)

The Chemistry of Culture in Buffalo, New York:  An Investigation of the Chemical Reactins Behind the Food People Eat and the Culture They Create

Cheryl Forbes, Adviser

Anna Rusch, Art History

The Art of Theresienstadt:  Reality Versus Illusion

Patricia Mathews, Adviser

Robert Taylor, Biology

The Irruptive Migratory Strategy of the Black-capped Chickadee:  An Integrative Study of Energetics and Spatial Orientation in Poecile atricapillus

Mark Deutschlander, Adviser

Deirdre Wholly, Chemistry

Solid-phase Synthesis of Depsipeptidic HDAC Inhibitors Through Chemoselective Macrocyclization

Justin Miller, Adviser