Other awards, recognitions & scholarships

Awards & honors
Awards & honors

SPIRIT OF SERVICE AWARD
Lisa Pennisi, associate professor of practice with the School of Natural Resources, has earned the Spirit of Service Award.

Each year, the Center for Civic Engagement recognizes stellar individuals that exemplify what it means to truly serve our community. Nominees for the faculty award must be a professor who has engaged in the area of academic service-learning or community-based research. “In an effort to become more civically aware and engaged, this professor has also helped to foster this same sense within their students,” the description states.

Pennisi accepted the award during a celebration Wednesday, April 19, in the Nebraska Union.

CENTER FOR GREAT PLAINS STUDIES
Larkin Powell, applied ecology mission leader at the School of Natural Resources, was elected to be a member of the Center for Great Plains Studies Board of Governors for a second three-year term beginning in September 2017. His current term began in 2014. Larkin also is a Great Plains Fellow, whose research has often focused on prairie habitats and their management and how it affects species populations.

John Benson, assistant professor of vertebrate ecology with SNR, also was named a Great Plains Fellow. Benson's work links studies of population, molecular, landscape, and behavioral ecology to contribute to both basic ecology and the conservation of wildlife populations and natural ecosystems. A current project of his focuses on mule deer populations.

For more on the fellow’s program, click here.

FLING FELLOWSHIP
Jessica Burnett, SNR doctoral student, has been awarded a Maude Hammond Fling Fellowship, one of the most prestigious fellowships offered by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. It is presented to graduate students who have demonstrated the highest levels of academic potential.

Fewer than 25 percent of those who apply for the award receive fellowship funding (Presidentil, Fling or Othmer). Burnett is just one of five to earn a Fling Fellowship award for the 2017-18 academic year. It provides a stipend that allows a student to be completely immersed in scholarship without having to hold an assistantship.

Burnett will be honored at a fellowship reception in early fall.

MOHR SCHOLARSHIP
Autumn Dunn, senior environmental restoration science, wildlife & fisheries, and grassland ecology triple major, has earned a Milton E. Mohr Scholarship.

The Mohr awards program, created in 1989, honors outstanding students in biotechnology and engineering. The awards are based on academic performance and potential for accomplishments in a specific field.

Milton E. Mohr (1915-2000) was described in his lifetime as “...engineer, inventor, entrepreneur, corporate leader” and was instrumental in providing key leadership to young adults. In 1938 he graduated, highest in his class, from UNL with a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering, and in 1959 UNL awarded him an honorary doctorate of engineering.

MERITORIOUS GRADUATE STUDENT AWARD
Hannah Birge, doctoral student, and Lyndsie Wszola, graduate student, were selected to receive the School of Natural Resources Meritorious Graduate Student Award.

The award usually is given to one master’s and one doctoral student annually. Birge and Wszola will each receive a $500 stipend and their names will be included on a plaque that hangs in Hardin Hall.

Natural Resources