University of Arkansas

The U of A Department of Industrial Engineering celebrated the achievements of its students during the annual Capstone Symposium and Student Awards Banquet at the Arkansas Union Verizon Ballroom. The full day of events highlighted a year of hard work, innovation and collaboration between students, faculty and industry partners. Industrial Engineering Department Chair Chase Rainwater said, "The Capstone Symposium and Student Awards Banquet are among our department's most important events of the academic year. They showcase not only the technical excellence of our students, but also their ability to create impact for industry partners."

U of A alumni Sherman Black and Lynnette Reeder Black have announced this year's recipients of the Black and Reeder Scholarship, which is awarded to Greenwood High School students and U of A students from Greenwood seeking degrees in engineering or business. Caden Slate will graduate from Greenwood High School in May and plans to study marketing at the Sam M. Walton College of Business. She will be a first-generation college student. Ben Pschier, a senior in electrical engineering from Greenwood, will also receive the Black and Reeder Scholarship for the 2026-2027 academic year. Pschier said high school experiences with soldering, robotics competitions and coding classes led him to the field.

The Alpha of Arkansas Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa held its annual initiation ceremony in May at Hillside Auditorium. The chapter inducted 94 new members from this year's graduating class at the university. Each new initiate signed the book, which has been used for the last 94 years to record names of Phi Beta Kappa members at the U of A, and promised to have paramount regard for moral character and scholarly attainment in the election of future members. They each received a certificate along with a light blue and pink cord to wear at commencement. Provost Indrajeet Chaubey addressed the new initiates and their families as the keynote speaker.

Fulbright College senior Jenna Klewsaat knows that persistence pays off in the end. Klewsaat, who is originally from Colorado, came to the University of Arkansas in 2020 and has overcome numerous obstacles, including the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet Klewsaat persisted, never giving up on her dream of graduating and seeing her name on Senior Walk.

When Katie McKay walks across the graduation stage this May, she'll be the third McKay sibling to earn a degree from the U of A College of Engineering. Her older brothers pursued computer engineering and computer science, but she took a different path, one that would lead her to discover a passion she never expected.

One student's goal to get more involved outside of academics paid off with two internships after getting connected with the Office of Entrepreneurship & Innovation (OEI).

Ryan Calabretta-Sajder and doctoral student Federico Tiberini recently showcased their research on Italian American culture at the annual conference of the Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States (MELUS), held in Austin, Texas, and co-sponsored by the University of Texas-Austin and Southern Methodist University.

Fifty-eight 2026 honors graduates were recently recognized at a reception as University of Arkansas's Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences honored students at its yearly academic awards reception.

Faculty and students from the Department of Mathematical Sciences recently represented the U of A at two regional conferences focused on mathematics and mathematics education, highlighting innovative approaches to teaching and research. Their presentations emphasized strategies for reducing student anxiety, enhancing engagement and improving student experiences in mathematics classrooms.

U of A startups earned more than $40,000 at the 25th annual Arkansas Governor's Cup, a startup competition open to students in seven states across the mid-south with a $141,000 cash prize pool. Altaris MedTech, which is developing a spray-based strep test that eliminates the need for traditional throat swabs, earned first place in the High Growth/Technology Graduate division to take home $20,000.

University Recreation and Wellness hosted its annual End of Year Celebration. The celebration recognizes the academic and occupational success of UREC's student employees and club sport officers, acknowledging students for university honors, awards and graduation.

The UARK Speech and Debate Society, traveled to Middle Tennessee State University to compete in the International Public Debate Association's National Tournament and Convention. The students involved brought home many accolades, including a 2nd Place Scholastic Sweepstakes, which represents all divisions containing undergraduate students combined. Season-long, the team had its most successful run to date, earning a total of 248 awards in a single season, including a national champion speaker in the varsity division.

Several undergraduate students from the University of Arkansas Communication Sciences and Disorders (CSDI) program recently presented research projects at the annual Arkansas Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ArkSHA) Convention, highlighting student-led work focused on clinical practice, research and community resources in speech-language pathology.

Altaris MedTech, a University of Arkansas student startup developing an innovative pain-free strep test, won fourth place at the prestigious Rice Business Plan Competition, earning U of A's best since 2018. Altaris was one of just 42 teams to qualify for the competition, which describes itself as the "world's largest and richest intercollegiate graduate student startup competition." Hosted by the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship at Rice University in Houston, Texas, the competition offers more than $1 million in investment and cash prizes.

As an active transportation coordinator in the Office for Sustainability on campus, Emma Armendariz spends every day working to make the U of A and Fayetteville more sustainable. Yet she found the university's Environmental Resiliency program still pushed her to deepen her understanding of sustainability and rethink how she approaches the work.

Several graduating Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design students at the University of Arkansas reflected on the experiences that have shaped their time in school and prepared them for what is next as they begin their careers. These spotlights feature six design students with diverse paths, perspectives and passions who share the growth, creativity and unique insights they have gained throughout their journey at the Fay Jones School and the U of A. Their reflections offer a closer look at their dedication as students and the positive impact they hope to make after graduation.

The largest cohort in the history of the McMillon Innovation Studio presented their projects last week at Demo Day, the bi-annual capstone that showcases a semester's worth of learning in the studio.The spring 2026 cohort included 16 design teams, which allow students to harness human-centered design principles to solve problems in an array of industries, and two product teams, which focus on teams producing a product that has a viable go-to-market strategy.

British by birth, Abel Fenwick's unlikely journey to studying cowboy literature at the U of A began in a hotel room in New Jersey binging Robert DuVall movies with a friend. That marathon included the Lonesome Dove miniseries, based off the beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Larry McMurtry.

More than 95 senior Capstone Design projects filled the floor of Bud Walton Arena, as the U of A's College of Engineering opened its annual Engineering Expo to the public for two hours of head-to-head judging. The event is the culmination of the senior design sequence, in which student teams across five engineering disciplines spend their final year solving problems posed by industry, healthcare and research partners.

Two U of A students in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) were awarded National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships, supporting their continued study and research in STEM fields. Abhinav Komanduri and Aidan Donoho were selected for the fellowship, which provides funding for graduate education, including up to three years of support within a five-year period.

Lovelace Amos, a higher education doctoral student at the University of Arkansas, was recently invited to attend the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Youth Forum 2026, an opportunity inviting youth from around the world to engage with member states and contribute to the global dialogue on key issues with international impacts. The forum was held in the U.N. headquarters in New York City under the theme "Innovate, Unite and Transform: Youth Shaping the Road to 2030."

This May, Holli Jenkins will walk across the stage at the University of Arkansas with a biological engineering degree and her dream job already secured. The path there was built on community, shaped by a supportive department, a student club meeting and the confidence to follow up with an email. Jenkins didn't arrive at the U of A planning to study biological engineering. She initially set her sights on mechanical engineering, but an info session for the First-Year Engineering Biological Engineering program changed everything.

From the smallest towns in the Louisiana Delta to cross-country van treks, a passion for design can begin in vastly different places. That was the case for two Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design students at the U of A who were recognized by Metropolis magazine, affirming them among the top emerging designers in North America. Emmalyn Burns and Dakota Kalkstein, both interior architecture and design majors, were named to this year's Future100 list due to their exceptional academic records and compelling portfolios, proving their creativity and commitment.

For fifth-year architecture student Joseph Hill, his approach to design is shaped by more than just the classroom. Growing up in Unterschleissheim, a small town near Munich, Germany, Hill was exposed to a different way of experiencing space, one that continues to influence his work today.

The Program in Creative Writing and Translation is pleased to announce that Jane Tucker has been awarded the undergraduate Felix Christopher McKean Memorial Award. The award was founded in 1945 to honor the memory of McKean, an Arkansas native of Lockesburg who, while studying foreign languages, business and mathematics at the U of A, discovered a passion for writing poetry.

Forty-five supply chain management majors from the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the U of A were inducted this spring into the Sigma Chi Mu Tau Honor Society. Sigma Chi Mu Tau is an honor society dedicated to recognizing outstanding juniors, seniors and graduate students in supply chain management, as well as educators and professionals who have demonstrated dedication and meaningful contributions to the profession. Membership is open to students who maintain an overall cumulative grade point average of at least 3.25 on a 4.00 scale and meet the following criteria:

The Gender Studies Program in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences is pleased to announce its second cohort of Maxine Miller Scholars. Named after luminary business owner of Maxine's Tap Room, Maxine Miller, scholars are selected based on the strength and innovation of their research projects, which must examine gender issues in a humanities field.

The University of Arkansas continues its tradition of national recognition for student excellence in public service, leadership and research as juniors Amie Donathan has been named a Goldwater Scholar, Muskan Taori a Truman Scholar and Claire Walker a Udall Scholar. These highly competitive national awards recognize students who demonstrate exceptional commitment to serving others, leading change and discovering solutions to challenging problems.

Sam Vinson is graduating this May from the U of A with two majors - biological engineering and Spanish - three minors, a Walmart internship and something most engineers don't accomplish before they receive their diploma: a first-author publication in a peer-reviewed journal.

The Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design recently announced that 109 students received scholarships and other awards through its 2026 Honors and Awards Recognition program. This year, nearly $400,000 was handed out through scholarships and awards that recognized various aspects of achievement among architecture, landscape architecture, and interior architecture and design students.