NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) recognizes 4 outstanding CBS graduate students

The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) recognizes outstanding graduate students pursuing research-based graduate degrees in STEM or STEM education. The purpose of the GRFP is to help ensure the quality, vitality, and diversity of the scientific and engineering workforce of the United States. The selection committee assesses candidates on the intellectual merit and broader impacts of their brief research proposals and personal statements. Unlike many grants, the GRFP supports the individual and not the proposed project and demonstrates a commitment to supporting early career graduate students. The GRFP grants three years of support over a five-year fellowship period, including a stipend and cost of education allowance, which allows students to focus on progressing their own research projects rather than teaching or working on research projects on behalf of their advisor.

As a GRFP winner in 2020, I joined the Biology Education Research lab of Dr. Katelyn Cooper. There I have been able to focus on research, which has earned the Research Recognition Award from the American Physiological Society Teaching Section in April 2021 and when I presented it as a part of the AAAS graduate student e-poster competition, I won first place in the social sciences category in February 2022.

I am excited to share that the Cooper Biology Education lab will be welcoming three more fellowship winners for next year; Nick Wiesenthal (current PhD student), Tasneem Mohammed (current master’s student and incoming PhD student), and Jynx Pigart-Coleman (incoming PhD student) were all recently announced as winners! Broadly, the Cooper lab studies how to create a more diverse and inclusive scientific community, particularly by understanding how mental health affects students in biology learning environments and we are eager to see the contributions that Nick, Tasneem, and Jynx make in graduate school!

Author: Carly Busch