The Enhance Your Education (EYE) Grant provides up to $1,000 to support travel, supplies or other costs associated with your honors capstone, study abroad program or honors-related research/artistry endeavor.
Read about the four recipients:
Gabriela Petrova was awarded funding to participate in the “From Waste to Wardrobe” project. This project significantly enhanced her academic experience by connecting her marketing studies to a real-world, purpose-driven initiative. This project gave her the opportunity to engage with branding, storytelling, and consumer perception in a meaningful way, helping her better understand where her interests lie.
The funding also gave her the opportunity to visit local markets and observe consumer behavior firsthand. As a marketing major, this was especially valuable because it moved her learning beyond the classroom and into real-world settings. Gabriela was able to see how people interact with sustainable products, what influences their purchasing decisions, and how presentation and messaging affect interest.
Emily Burris received funding to create The Elements Among us: The periodic table Reimagined. This has given her the opportunity to develop her independent thinking and improve her ability to work alone. Emily has worked alone on this project, and this has allowed her to increase her critical thinking skills and analytical thinking skills. Along with this it has helped her with her thinking when it comes to double-checking sources and ensuring the research is correct. Without the funding, she would not have been able to complete this project.
Ally Coker was awarded funding to help with her project: Using Simulation and Physical Validation to Evaluate and Optimize a Formula SAE Car. The funding has enhanced her academic experience by providing her with an exceptional hands-on introduction to theory that she will learn later in the classroom. Having funding to complete load cell experiments is an opportunity that is difficult to obtain and get approved due to the expense of the parts. Ally has discovered ways to quantitatively and qualitatively validate her simulated expected results. Through her research she has been able to learn Computational Fluid Dynamics in SolidWorks and Ansys which are skills that she will use not only for her internship this summer but also in her future career.
Alia Moran received funding to present her project, Living Archaeology: A Comparative Perspective on How Archaeologists Can Study and Document the Present. This research has been her most ambitious topic yet, as she had to argue and support an entirely new theoretical framework and methodology in the discipline of archaeology. Alia learned how to persist in the face of changes, think outside the current literature of the discipline, and properly communicate and argue her claims through an in-person presentation and a written thesis.
Receiving this funding made it possible for Alia to present her research about archaeologists to archaeologists. It was so important that she could share her thoughts on an ethical question with the people that it is affecting and participating in it, rather than a conference full of other disciplines. Participating, and winning, the 2026 SAA Ethics Bowl allowed Alia to continue thinking and talking about ethics in a way she could not have without attending the SAA conference.
