Student Award Recipients

Each year, the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Department honors one or two graduating undergraduate students with the Outstanding Undergraduate Award. This award recognizes an outstanding undergraduate student who has demonstrated exceptional achievement in academic performance, course work, capstone paper, WGSS-related advocacy, and meaningful contributions to the WGSS community. This past academic year, several graduate students also received public internship awards, internal fellowships, and Taft funding to support their research and professional development activities during the summer months.

One major point of pride for the department is the three undergraduate students who were invited to join Phi Beta Kappa. Phi Beta Kappa is the oldest and most prestigious academic honor society in the United States. Members represent the top university graduates across the country, so this achievement is no small feat. Major congratulations to our 3 Phi Beta Kappa graduates: Madelyn Braun, Phoebe Gaffney, and Abby Hager.

Phoebe graduated from the University of Cincinnati with a bachelor's in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, along with certificates in LGBTQ Studies and Professional Writing. At UC, they focused on the intersections of queer theory, gender expression, and music while researching ways to make queer and feminist academia more accessible. Their academic work explores topics such as queer temporality, trans allegories, and the impact of queer-only and women-only concerts on the LGBTQ community. On and off campus, Phoebe advocated for students’ rights in a variety of ways. They gave testimony twice against Ohio’s Senate Bill 1, participated in peaceful protests on campus, and volunteered at their hometown LGBTQ Center. They also received 1st place in UC’s Professional Writing Prize and were inducted into Pi Epsilon Pi, the National Writing Honor Society.  They also made the Dean’s List 8 times while here at UC. Phoebe plans to move back to their hometown of Detroit to work in LGBTQ activism and advocacy.

Madelyn Braun graduated in April 2026 with degrees in Social Justice and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and certificates in LGBTQ+ Studies and Legal Studies.  She earned a 3.9 GPA and was named a Cincinnatus Presidential Scholar and University Honors Program member. Her academic and applied work consistently centered on reproductive justice and accessibility. Specifically, her WGSS capstone examined postpartum reproductive justice for Black women in Cincinnati, drawing on local archival and database research, and her Social Justice capstone designed a mock course to support first-generation college students. Alongside her coursework, she served as a Research Assistant in the School of Political Science and International Affairs analyzing legislation on LGBT rights and reproductive healthcare, and worked as an Accessibility Remediation Associate bringing university materials into Title II compliance. She also spent over a year as a Call Center Representative in Enrollment Services, guiding students through financial aid processes with clarity and care. Madelyn plans to continue this work after graduation at a Cincinnati-based nonprofit focused on reproductive justice and community needs.

The faculty awarded Elizabeth the outstanding graduate student award for their academic excellence and service to the WGS community. Elizabeth is smart, intellectually curious, and an exciting emerging scholar in queer feminist disability studies. Their work in this area includes their MA project, “Disability, Agency, and Care: Cripping the Community,” and numerous conference and event presentations from “Disability ‘Inclusion’ and the Failings of Higher Education" at Feminist Perspectives on Body, Disability and Health at Penn State University to "Clone Wars, Clankers, and Cyborgs: Conceptualizing Crip Futurities" at WisCon, the feminist science fiction & fantasy convention advisory committee for the New Directions in Disability Studies conference at UC. Elizabeth also provided other valuable services to the departmental and UC community as GA at the LGBTQ center, relaunching the Closet. In WGSS, we can always count on Elizabeth to attend and contribute to departmental events, from leading sessions of feminist forum to sharing delicious homemade baked goods. As the graduate student representative on the graduate student affairs committee, they advocated with a strong voice for their peers and were instrumental in curricular and admissions decisions. Elizabeth is going on to earn a PHD in WGSS at the Ohio State University, having been awarded full funding, including two years of fellowship. 

Sol Ouzounian Kersey earned their MA in WGSS in 2018.  Their final project, titled “Complicating the Margins: Demonstrating the Need for a Complex Understanding of Voter Disenfranchisement,” offered an intersectional analysis of the supreme court majority opinion in Shelby County vs Holder, in context of the history of disenfranchisement of Black Women in the United States.  After their MA in WGS, Sol went on to earn a JD at the UC college of law in 2021. Sol’s career exemplifies central WGSS department values, including a strong commitment to social justice, advocacy, the intersection of theory & praxis, and service to the community.  They served as a Legal Fellow at the African American Policy Forum, working under Kimberlé Crenshaw, and as Visiting Faculty at Miami University, where they taught Introduction to Women’s & Gender Studies and Introduction to Critical Race & Ethnic Studies. They currently work at Equality Ohio, Ohio’s statewide LGBTQ+ advocacy and legal aid organization. as a Legal Clinic Intake Coordinator Last year Sol ran for Cincinnati City Council, illustrating how their commitment to social justice, community service, and advocacy reaches beyond their place of employment.

Roqui, a second-year MA student from Costa Rica, received the Dornette Public Internship award, which supported their work at the Louisville Youth Group in Louisville, Kentucky.  As part of their internship, Roqui contributed to the planning and implementation of programs for LGBTQ+ youth, represented the organization through community tabling at multiple events, and supported youth programming by helping facilitate activities and spending time with participants. They also assisted with organizing the community space, developing event itineraries, and preparing for future programs and events. Roqui reflects that "this experience allowed me to apply the knowledge and skills I developed through my studies in LGBTQ+ theory while also gaining a deeper understanding of how these theories are put into practice through community-based work and advocacy."

The Marquita McLean Research Grant allowed Talisa the opportunity to work at the Ohio Justice and Policy Center (OJPC). Through their Second Chance Program, Talisa worked with incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women in Ohio who are victims of trafficking. OJPC offers those women free legal support for crimes committed while they were being trafficked. Talisa was tasked with writing a memorandum on healthcare issues plaguing incarcerated women in Ohio, focusing specifically on elder care, abortion and pregnancy care, and mental healthcare. Talisa was able to combine scholarly journals and articles on the topic with talking to incarcerated women about their experiences with the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (ODRC) health services, the kite system (ODRC's health delivery service), and the recent Ohio legislation that requires prisons to offer menstrual products for free. The goal of this research is to have a holistic view of incarcerated healthcare in Ohio, as incarcerated individuals' health impacts their prison experience and recidivism. Women have gender-specific health needs and deserve proper access and care regardless of incarcerated status. The research discusses the current prison healthcare landscape, its failures and lack of oversight, and realistic avenues for how Ohio legislation and ODRC policy can be updated to better support incarcerated women. OJPC will be able to use this research for policy concerns. This research also o opens up potential research for ODRC's health delivery services based on gendered and racial demographics, as well as the increase in Ohio individuals diagnosed with mental illnesses being incarcerated.

Prisca used her Friends fellowship to support her research exploring how different social identities intersect to shape migrant and local women's experiences of vulnerability, access to humanitarian assistance, and the everyday survival strategies in Chipinge, Zimbabwe. Her post-graduation plans are to pursue a PhD in Gender Studies or a related field which matches are interests in gender, migration, humanitarianism, and social work.