Student Academic Showcase Called 'A Great Success'

This year's edition of Lander University's Student Academic Showcase was "a great success," according to Dr. Alice Taylor-Colbert, SAS Committee chair.

The event seeks to reward students for academic excellence and to inspire them to pursue higher levels of engagement in their chosen disciplines. It features creative compositions in studio arts and performances in fine arts, as well as scholarly presentations, posters and research papers.

Taylor-Colbert, who founded the showcase in 2010, said that the quality of the student performances "advances each year."

The performances by the theatre, dance and music students at this year's awards ceremony, she said, "were quite superior."

Taylor-Colbert said that the showcase's partnership with Alpha Chi, the National Honor Society, "is strengthening our offerings as well."

She said that the new requirement of having participants to submit abstracts of their projects as part of the application process represents another step forward.

"The process of summarizing their projects causes the students and faculty sponsors to reflect on the importance of the topic and refine the conclusions that come from the research or creative performance," she said.

Taylor-Colbert expressed the hope that next year, "the Greenwood community will attend some of the sessions to see how terrific our academic programs are at Lander."

Participating departments and winners in this year's showcase were:

• Art -- Whitney Price, of Pendleton
• Biological and Physical Sciences -- Paul Glover, of Spartanburg
• Computing -- William LaForge, of Hodges; Erik Stoddard, of Simpsonville; and Joshua Wiggins, of Chapin
• Mathematics -- Dustan Gregory, of Union; and Marie Hardy, of Anderson
• English -- Lauren Shiflet, of Greenwood
• History and Philosophy -- Josh Watt, of Piedmont
• Mass Communication and Theatre -- Ashlin Taylor Crout, of Greenwood
• Music -- Kevin Baggett, of Greenwood; Cody Beard, of Ninety Six; Markela Dandy, of Graniteville; Kelsie Detweiler, of Abbeville; Jessica Hart, of Starr; Tyree Scott, of Greenwood; Haley Shelton, of Ninety Six; Michael Waltman, of Seneca; Tyler Will, of Greenwood; and Corrie Woods, of Leavenworth, Kan.
• Psychology -- Holly Cantrell, of Walhalla