More than 850 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2022 Spring Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
Alyssa Parkhurst, a senior majoring in environmental studies and American Indian studies, has been named a 2022 Udall Scholar. Only 55 students across the United States are selected each year, and Parkhurst is only the second Auggie ever to have received this scholarship.
As a Udall Tribal Public Policy Scholar, Parkhurst will receive $7,000 and spend five days in Tucson, Arizona, at Scholar Orientation, where she will extend her professional network, meet other scholars and alumni, and learn new skills.
The Udall Foundation awards scholarships to college sophomores and juniors for leadership, public service, and commitment to issues related to Native American nations or to the environment.
Parkhurst is an Act Six Scholar, summer intern and farmer at Dream of Wild Health, environmental stewardship coordinator at Augsburg, oshkaabewis (ceremonial helper) to her Elder, Noodinesiikwe, and an old-style jingle dress dancer and educator. Congratulations, Alyssa!
Augsburg nursing students Valerie DeCora Guimaraes (left) and Jenna Nelson.
Jenna Nelson and Valerie DeCora Guimaraes, two nurses pursuing advanced degrees at Augsburg University, have received the inaugural Nilsson Transcultural Nurse of the Year Award. Transcultural nursing emphasizes care in culturally diverse settings, including outreach to people who are underserved by traditional care systems and who exist outside of the social mainstream. The award is named for professor emerita Beverly Nilsson, who chaired Augsburg’s Department of Nursing and championed care for people living in poverty.
Nelson has spent the majority of her career working with marginalized communities as an emergency department nurse. While working to become a family nurse practitioner, she has engaged extensively as an intern and volunteer at Augsburg’s Health Commons. These nurse-led drop-in sites provide hospitality and care to guests from diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds, many of whom are unhoused or living with mental illness. When the pandemic closed the drop-in locations, Nelson joined a team making weekly food deliveries to local encampments. “Jenna truly accompanies people on their journeys, wherever the path may bring her,” said Health Commons Executive Director Katie Clark.
Guimaraes is the Mayo Clinic’s first Patient Experience Ambassador to work solely with Native American patients. In this role she works to dispel myths about Native American patients and educates colleagues across the Mayo enterprise about health disparities and spiritual care practices. She established a medication initiative to coordinate care with the Indian Health Service upon patient discharge from Mayo, developed a Native American family fund to address food and transportation needs, and successfully advocated to hire additional Native American Patient Navigators in Minnesota and Arizona. “These successes for Native American patients have not been easy,” said Guimaraes, who is pursuing a doctor of nursing practice degree at Augsburg. “It is my passion to help my people that keeps me going.”
Augsburg offers a comprehensive set of programs for nurses who want to advance their careers, including bachelor’s degree completion, master of arts in nursing, and doctor of nursing practice. Health equity and inclusion have been a major focus of the curriculum and experiential learning both locally and globally since the program’s founding. Augsburg’s doctor of nursing practice was one of the nation’s first programs to focus on transcultural nursing leadership.
Augsburg University will celebrate the classes of 2022, 2021, and 2020 at an in-person commencement ceremony at U.S. Bank Stadium in downtown Minneapolis on Wednesday, May 4 at 6:00 p.m.
Augsburg’s commencement ceremony reflects the diversity of its community, as graduates traditionally wear stoles and cords of different colors that represent affiliation with various communities and programs. Flags displayed at commencement represent sovereign nations of American Indian students and countries of the international students graduating in the ceremony.
Tickets are required to attend in person, but the ceremony will also be live streamed via YouTube. Follow the celebration through the hashtag #AuggieGrad on all social media platforms, where students will be sharing images of the celebration.
Augsburg University biology major Justin Holewa ’23 has received a $25,000 Boren Scholarship to study Korean in South Korea for a full year.
Boren Scholars study a wide range of critical languages, come from diverse fields of study, and immerse themselves in the language and cultures of selected world regions through study abroad. Scholarship recipients make a commitment to work in the U.S. federal government for a minimum of one year. Having recently completed a summer of research under the mentorship of Dr. Leon van Eck, Holewa envisions working for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, including on a plant disease called citrus greening.
An initiative of the U.S. Defense Language and National Security Education Office, the Boren awards focus on geographic areas, languages, and fields of study critical to U.S. national security that are not emphasized in other U.S. study abroad programs. Applicants are selected through a national merit-based competition that emphasizes both academic achievement and a strong commitment to public service.
Fourteen Augsburg sociology students recently joined the Jewish Community Relations Council’s annual trip to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Tim Pippert, the Joel Torstenson endowed professor of sociology, led the Augsburg group, who were also joined by a group from Minnesota Hillel.
“For us, it provided the opportunity to show how sociology is applicable in lots of different ways,” Pippert said in an interview with TC Jewfolk about the group’s experience. “So I asked [the students] to think about this trip and the experience in the museum, as how does their sociological training inform what they witnessed? How did the theories that they’ve read about, how does that play out in the symbolic representation of a horrific tragedy? How do you choose to tell that story? And what are the symbols that are used to tell that story?”
Pa Her ’23 is one of 173 students from the United States and Mexico who have been named 2022-23 Newman Civic Fellows by Campus Compact. Her received the fellowship in recognition of her contributions to community building, equity, and food justice through her work with Augsburg’s Campus Kitchen and Campus Cupboard, as well as her leadership of Augsburg’s work on a National Institute of Food and Agriculture grant focused on food access research, advocacy, and service.
“In response to food insecurity made worse by the pandemic, Pa and the team built new partnerships with food providers and community-based organizations to make fresh, healthy food available to neighbors and students,” wrote Augsburg President Paul C. Pribbenow in Her’s fellowship nomination. “Pa shows up to work every day eager to collaborate, solve problems, and do whatever is needed to best serve students and our surrounding community.”
The Newman Civic Fellowship recognizes students who stand out for their commitment to creating positive change in communities locally and around the world. Fellows benefit from learning and networking opportunities, including the two-day Annual Convening of Fellows.
More than 1,000 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2021 Fall Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
Nearly 100 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2021 Summer Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
More than 1,000 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2021 Spring Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
More than 850 Augsburg University undergraduate students were named to the 2022 Spring Semester Dean’s List. The Augsburg University Dean’s List recognizes those full-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.50 or higher and those part-time students who have achieved a grade point average of 3.75 or higher in a given term.
Augsburg University will celebrate the classes of 2022, 2021, and 2020 at an in-person commencement ceremony at U.S. Bank Stadium in downtown Minneapolis on Wednesday, May 4 at 6:00 p.m.
Augsburg University biology major Justin Holewa ’23 has received a $25,000 Boren Scholarship to study Korean in South Korea for a full year.
