undergraduate

Madalyn Gragg, an undergraduate in mechanical engineering and general physics, is one of three students at Oregon State University chosen to receive the 2024 Barry Goldwater Scholarship, a national award established in 1986 in memory of Sen. Barry Goldwater.

In her scholarship application essay, Gragg reflected on the challenges she faced in getting into college coming from a school designated under Title I-A as a school that serves children from families experiencing poverty.

For the past two years, Iman Stephenson, a nuclear engineering student earning her bachelor’s degree this spring, has investigated how materials respond to the high temperatures (500-1000 C) specified for next-generation nuclear reactors. She says this research experience has been invaluable.

“I learned what it means to be in the nuclear engineering field from working with graduate students,” she said. “There are a lot more opportunities than I realized.”

Elise Cordle’s senior year at South Albany High School ended abruptly (and three months early) with the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. Classes were canceled; graduation celebrations were postponed. But that didn’t thwart Cordle’s ambition to be the first in her family to attend college.

“College is something that was always talked about in my family,” Cordle said. “My parents would have attended if they’d had the opportunity, and it was something they really wanted for me.”

Photos by Chance Saechao.

Working toward bachelor’s degrees in energy systems engineering and sustainability at Oregon State University-Cascades in Bend, Dallas Bennett is dedicated to designing greener systems on a local level.

“I’m from Silverton, Oregon,” Bennett said. “Growing up in a small town, I have a tight-knit sense of community. It would be really nice to work directly with any community that I’m a part of.”

Amy Glen loves skiing, so much that it factored into her decision to attend the University of Vermont, where the Alaska native majored in biology and competed with the university’s ski team.

After graduating with her bachelor’s degree, Glen worked at a lab that conducted analytical chemistry studies for pharmaceutical companies, where she worked with a lot of Excel spreadsheets. She realized that automating the manual data entry tasks would help her become more efficient in her job, but she didn’t have any programming background.

Subisha Sundaram, an Honors College student pursuing her bachelor’s degree in radiation health physics, appreciates the student support systems in the College of Engineering and throughout Oregon State University.

Growing up, Elaine Gething Davis, ’49, would hear an airplane soaring above her family’s coastal Oregon farm and rush outside with everyone else to watch it. Later, living near a military base during World War II, she was amazed by the variety of airborne machines leaping into the sky. After the war, her father bought a surplus airplane and gave the whole family flying lessons. Thus began a lifelong fascination with things that fly.

When she arrived at Oregon State College in 1945, she was the sole woman in her mechanical engineering class.

Yue Cao, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering in the Energy Systems research group, has received a Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award from the National Science Foundation. The award includes a grant of nearly $500,000 over five years.

Barbara Simpson, assistant professor of structural engineering, has received a Faculty Early Career Development, or CAREER, award from the National Science Foundation. The award includes a grant of nearly $600,000 over five years.