News releases

May 8, 2006

TO: Reporters, assignment editors
FROM: University Communications, (608) 262-0930, bsmattmi@wisc.edu
RE: Interesting Spring 2006 graduates

To assist with Commencement coverage at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, University Communications has compiled stories on some of the many noteworthy achievers from the class of 2006. The following students have agreed to be available to media for interviews this weekend (May 12-14) or before Commencement proceedings.

- Justin Brown, Minnetonka, Minn., degree in geology, Sunday at 10 a.m.

Contact: Justin Brown, (608) 698-2487, jrbrown5@wisc.edu; Clifford Thurber (608) 262-6027, clifft@geology.wisc.edu

From his collegiate get-go, Justin Brown followed his childhood muse. As a child, Brown was intrigued by the forces that drive earthquakes and volcanoes. Through his relationship with UW-Madison earth scientist Clifford Thurber, Brown has been able to take the measure of both.

Brown found Thurber by searching the UW-Madison department of geology and geophysics Web pages as a freshman, a hunt that led to a three-year stint in Thurber's group which, in turn, led to a detailed study of the earthquakes that occur within Alaska's Mount Spurr volcano. His findings may help scientists better predict volcanic eruptions. Says Thurber: "His results suggest that a particular set of earthquakes deep beneath the volcano may be a reliable indicator of impending eruption."

Volcanoes can be notoriously difficult to predict, Thurber says, and Brown's work promises to contribute to better methods for forecasting eruptions. Brown will pursue graduate study at Stanford University in the fall.

- UW-Madison graduates involved in the Village Health Project, a landmark service project that brought a team of students to Uganda in 2005:

- Abby Stepaniak, Wauwatosa, degree in rehabilitation psychology, (414) 690-8409, arstepaniak@gmail.com

- Callie O'Neal, Muskego, degree in biology and biochemistry, meoneil@wisc.edu

- Alexander Means, Madison, degree in genetics, admeans@wisc.edu

- Krista Winter, McFarland, degree in nutritional sciences, (608) 838-9823, kristawinter@wisc.edu

How could Stepaniak possibly repay the hospitality and intense learning environment she had experienced in Uganda? Stepaniak had gone there to focus on health and nutrition in a global context as part of a UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences trip.

"We learned so much about the public health situation in that country, and met a lot of inspiring people working to improve conditions there," she says. "Since accessibility to clean water is a huge issue in Uganda, we decided to concentrate our efforts around that."

A Wisconsin Idea Fellowship from the UW-Madison Morgridge Center for Public Service helped the team of students work with local health officials to set up four rainwater collection tanks in the Lyantonde district of western Uganda.

"The tanks will provide clean and disease-free water to the local communities," says Stepaniak.

Stepaniak and the other students have established a nonprofit agency, Village Health Project (www.VillageHealthProject.org), to smooth the road to grants.

"We have received one from the Madison Rotary Foundation to construct three more rainwater collection tanks, and are expanding our efforts to include a water-filtration project, a primary school renovation project and a sandal collection project," she says. "We also have helped extensively with the Invisible Children Campaign, which helps child soldiers in northern Uganda. That area is currently in a war that has lasted 20 years."

Next year, Stepaniak will begin a Peace Corps Masters International program through the University of Washington-Seattle. Not surprisingly, she has asked to be placed in Uganda. "I fell in love with the people and culture, even though everything is so different than what I am used to," she says.

All of the students listed above are available to comment further on the Village Health Project.

- Laura Klunder, Franklin, Wis., social work degree, Sunday at 2 p.m.

Contact: ljklunder@wisc.edu, (608) 265-2526

A social work major, Klunder's field placement is with Domestic Abuse Intervention Services in the Legal Team. She will be enrolling in the MSW (master's in social work) program at UW-Madison in the fall.

Klunder is currently working as a violence prevention community organizer with University Health Services to support the Fraternity Action Coalition and other male-centered leadership in efforts to end violence against women.

She was a University of Wisconsin Outstanding Women of Color Award Nominee in 2004-05 and former executive staff member of the Multicultural Student Coalition. She is founder and co-coordinator of "Project 433: Confronting the Liberal Myth of Madison," a large student-driven collaborative that addresses hate crimes, racism and social action on campus and in Madison.

- Nama Singh, Minneapolis, economics and sociology degrees, and certificate in women's studies, Sunday at 10 a.m. Contact: namratasingh@wisc.edu, (763) 443-9436

For the past two years, Singh has served as the staff chair of PAVE: Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment, supervising a staff of six part-time student workers who reach thousands of students each year to talk about sexual assault, relationship violence, consent and violence prevention strategies.

Singh is joining the New York Teaching Fellows program next year as a math teacher and plans to attend law school.

- Bonnie Jean Williams, Milwaukee, journalism and Afro-American studies degrees, Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (414) 659-1165 or 262-3410 (work on campus)

Williams was among the first high school students selected to participate in PEOPLE in 1999 and is now among the first to graduate with degrees in journalism and Afro-American studies.

She has lifted as she climbed, mentoring and tutoring younger students of color in the PEOPLE program as well as teaching a class in the Undergraduate Research Scholars Program and the Writing Center.

"I can see improvement in the students, and I think the program [PEOPLE] is going in a really good direction. It really forces you to open up, and it brings out the best in people. I know it did for me," Williams says.

Williams has been accepted as a Ph.D. candidate in the English department. She plans to become a writing instructor.

- Kannitha Sith, Chicago, political science and Afro-American studies degrees, Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (773) 369-2042, (608) 264-3344

Sith was born in a Cambodia refugee camp during the horror of the killing fields. Her parents escaped and came to America with big dreams in their heads and nothing in their hands.

"For me to have attended an accredited four-year university and successfully graduate is not something many people expected from a refugee family," Sith says.

She is passionate about increasing access and opportunities to higher education for students from low-income communities. She has been a multicultural resident counselor and a vocal advocate for improving campus climate.

Her plans include law school and a master's degree in education, focusing on social justice issues and making educational policy more inclusive.

- Karlin Younger, Madison, international studies, East Asian studies and Chinese degrees, Sunday at 10 a.m. Contact: kyounger@wisc.edu

On campus, Karlin Younger has proven herself a leader. As president of UW-Madison National Society of Collegiate Scholars, she coordinated a charity ball to benefit HIV/AIDS and raised $1,400 for research. This summer, Younger will head to Taiwan to study Mandarin Chinese. Her education has been made possible by a TECRO (Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office) scholarship administered through the U.S. Department of Education and the Ministry of Education in Taiwan.

- Cynthia Martens, Winnetka, Ill., degree in Italian, Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (847) 533-8401, cemartens@wisc.edu

Martens, who also earned a certificate in European Studies with comprehensive honors from Letters and Sciences, is winner of three scholarships from the department of French and Italian. She acquired foreign language skills in and out of the classroom.

Growing up, Martens attended a bilingual school in Paris; in college, she studied abroad in Perugia, Italy. Martens has also served as college editor and opinion columnist at the Badger Herald campus newspaper and held summer internships in journalism at the Pioneer Press and Chicago Magazine. During her senior year, Martens worked part time for the Chicago Tribune Special Sections.

Upon graduation, she will move abroad to pursue a career as free-lance print journalist.

- Rosa Maria Cisneros Kostic, Chicago, dance degree, Saturday at 10 a.m.

Contact: (608) 843-2404, olecisneros@hotmail.com

"Everything I do, I do with Gypsy pride, with honesty and integrity," says Kostic. She says that her mother handed down that approach to life and she credits her interest in dance and movement to the same source. "My mother got me interested in Flamenco dance," she says.

In coming years, Kostic will tie education and movement together democratically - "I want what I teach to translate to real life," she says. "I think movement can impact the ways we think about and deal with racism, classism and diversity issues."

Kostic's undergraduate career has not been easy. In addition to her studies, she has been helping care for her mother in Chicago, who has cancer.

"We figure she has about a year left," says Kostic. "The guilt I have about being in Madison when she's in Chicago really affected the way I move myself. In the back of my mind I know that she can hardly move. But she brings her Gypsy point of view into her life as it is now. And I'm really thankful to be able to walk up Bascom Hill. It's a gift."

Kostic will attend graduate school in New Mexico this fall. But first she will spend the summer in Madison, helping students in the university's PEOPLE program explore dance history.

- Kristin Michelle Boerner, Wisconsin Rapids, political science and communication arts degrees, Sunday at 10 a.m. Contact: (715) 325-3179, kmboerner@wisc.edu

While at UW-Madison, Boerner established herself as an active student and scholar. In 2005, she was selected as Public Policy and International Affairs (PPIA) fellow at the Heinz School of Public Policy and Management at Carnegie Mellon University. On campus, she was heavily involved with the Morgridge Center for Public Service and the Wisconsin Union Directorate Alternative Breaks Committee.

Post-graduation, Boerner will join the 2006 Teach For America corps, a national corps of recent college graduates who commit to teach for two years in a public, urban or rural school.

- Lindsey Blank, Winona, Minn., degree in Spanish and global studies certificate, Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (507) 312-0571, ljblank@wisc.edu

Students looking for assistance in UW-Madison's Study Abroad office found a wealth of experience in peer adviser Lindsey Blank. Studies at UW-Madison "opened my eyes to a wide variety of international opportunities," she says. "I really enjoyed seeing what my peers had done in the global arena." In addition to semesters in Alcal�, Spain and Santiago, Chile, she traveled to 23 countries. While her first semester abroad deepened her knowledge of Spanish language and culture, the hands-on volunteer work she undertook during her second semester solidified her desire to help others.

Blank's studies on campus proved equally fulfilling. She considers her pursuit of a global studies certificate "a great networking opportunity," especially her work with sociology professor Joe Elder, a specialist in Southeast Asian studies. She also collaborated with the Jewish Studies department as she examined Jewish exile literature in medieval Spain. She explored her own family heritage through a capstone research project dealing with the Czech Republic.

Blank will study law at the City University of New York, a school specializing in "law in the service of human needs."

- Marian Weidner, Warrenville, Ill., degree in rural sociology, Saturday at 10 a.m. Contact: (630) 930-9858, mpweidner@wisc.edu

As a Badger volleyball player, Weidner regularly traveled to matches across the United States and Europe. As a student in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, however, her interest in the environment took her far beyond Western cities. After a semester studying abroad in China, Weidner furthered her tropical ecology studies in Costa Rica immediately after returning from a two-week workshop in Sri Lanka on permaculture design (community building and sustainable agriculture). During the Sri Lanka trip, floods trapped her and her colleagues on a small island. Their only way out involved a suspension bridge partially destroyed by a rogue elephant - that was still roaming the countryside after killing a farmer.

Weidner plans to stay close to home for the next few months. Building on her work with community supported agriculture farms, she plans to assist in the garden of a young man with autism.

- Tejinder Judge, Malaysia, degree in computer science, Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (608) 770-4408, tkjudge@wisc.edu

When Tejinder Judge, who is from a Sikh Punjabi family in rural Malaysia, received a scholarship to study at an American university, government officials instructed her to select one of the top 15 universities in her field. Judge chose UW-Madison on the strength of its computer science ranking in U.S. News and World Report. Though she arrived in the United States by herself, she hasn't been alone while in Madison. She built a deep relationship with host parents Don Jones and Karen Lavallee, who met her through the Council on International Visitors.

Though Judge has received accolades for her studies in bioinformatics, including a Women In Science Scholarship for two months of summer research, funded by the National Science Foundation, her work with languages stands out. She speaks Malaysian, Punjabi, English and some French. Thanks to a podcasting grant from the university's Division of Information Technology, she also has spent two semesters of independent study creating a series of Sinhala language lessons for travelers to Sri Lanka, although she does not speak Sinhala.

Judge will begin a Ph.D. program this fall at Virginia Tech; Jones and Lavallee plan to accompany her.
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