Honors College Recognizes Class of 2016

The University of Missouri-Kansas City Honors College recognized the graduating class of 2016 at the annual Honors College Banquet on April 13.

The Honors College acknowledged twenty-two seniors graduating with University Honors, seven of which were awarded the highest distinction UMKC offers as Honors Scholars. Each graduating senior received a Recognition of Achievement and an Honors College medallion. Those graduating as Honors Scholars also received a blue cord to be worn at commencement.

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Graduates at a Glance

Ida Ayalew
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Amanda Cook
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Chloe David
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Terrance Hughes
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Derick Letman
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Jordan Miles
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Sarah Park
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Molly Penrod
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Stevi Short
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Stephen Tran
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Joseph Young
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Kelly Bisges
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Haley Crane
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Hannah Goebel
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Sydney Harvey
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Hannah Huhman
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Abigail Menke
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Safa Nawazish
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Cole Payne
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Ashlynd Ritzinger
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Clara Stahl
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Layney Viets
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Honors College Student Assistant Position: Now open to all students who have a work-study award for fall semester 2016

The UMKC Honors College is accepting applications for the Honors College Student Assistant position. The Student Assistant will be expected to work 15-28 hours a week in the office. The Student Assistant will report to the Executive Assistant of the Honors College.

Duties will be assigned by the supervisor. These may include, but are not limited to:

  • Maintain student records for the Honors College
  • Assist with maintaining databases for the Honors College
  • Assist with processing online applications
  • Assist with preparing materials for recruiting events and admissions
  • Staff an Honors College informational table at recruiting events
  • Manage the Honors College Email account
  • Maintain the Honors College Website
  • Maintain the Honors College Facebook account and assist with other social media
  • Send announcements via the Honors College List serve
  • Assist with maintaining the Honors College Bulletin Board in Haag Hall
  • Serve as editor of the Honors College Weekly e-Newsletter
  • Build surveys using Qualtrics for the Honors College
  • Assist with special projects, including the Honors College Induction Ceremony, Cherry Hall Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, Lucerna Symposium, and the Honors College Banquet
  • Provide general administrative support – answer phones, greet customers, filing, photocopying, shipping, etc.

Minimum Qualifications:

  • The Student Assistant must be an undergraduate student at UMKC with effective listening, writing, editing, proofreading, and oral communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications:

  • Active member in good standing of the UMKC Honors College
  • Professional attitude
  • Flexibility and adaptability to new assignments and situations
  • Ability to multi-task and be highly productive in a fast-paced work environment
  • Punctuality and reliability
  • Attention to detail
  • Superior writing, editing, and proofreading ability
  • Excellent interpersonal and verbal skills
  • Strong problem-solving skills
  • Ability to meet critical deadlines
  • Ability to effectively handle constructive criticism
  • Ability to work well in a team and independently with minimal supervision
  • Ability to communicate clearly and courteously with UMKC faculty, staff, students, parents, vendors, and community partners
  • Ability to maintain confidentiality and apply sensitivity and sound judgement to all situations
  • Intermediate or advanced proficiency with all Microsoft Office Programs, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Publisher
  • Intermediate or advanced proficiency with Outlook, Word Press, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn

This is a part-time student assistant position, which requires 15-28 hours a week in the Honors College Office, Monday through Friday.

Hourly pay rate: $10.50/hour

Apply online at https://umkc.co1.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_29LM7G4nzSyfsIB, and send a resume (in PDF or Microsoft Word format) to honors@umkc.edu.

Equal Employment Opportunity:

UMKC is an equal access, equal opportunity, affirmative action employer that is fully committed to achieving a diverse faculty and staff. The university will recruit and employ qualified personnel and will provide equal opportunities during employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, age, disability status, protected veteran status or any other characteristic protected by law. For more information on Equal Employment Opportunity, call the Vice Chancellor – Human Resources at 816-235-1621.

To request ADA accommodations, please call the Director of Affirmative Action at 816-235-1323.

EEO IS THE LAW

To read more about Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) please use the following links:

EEO is the Law English Version
EEO is the Law Spanish Version
EEO is the Law Chinese Version

Honors College Students Receive Research Awards

Three Honors College students were presented with awards at the 16th Annual Symposium of Undergraduate Research & Creative Scholarship on Thursday, April 21.

Abigail Brown was awarded first place in the Social Justice Scholars category for her presentation, “Childhood Obesity: An Environmental Divide”.

Madeline Lewis was awarded fourth place in the same category for her presentation, “Racial Diversity in Honors Colleges”.

Abigail Menke received the Biological and Health Sciences distinction for her presentation, “Loss of Heterozygosity in Aging Yeast Colonies”, which she completed with peer Justin Minor.

Click here to view all awards and distinctions and to learn more about the Symposium of Undergraduate Research & Creative Scholarship.

Kansas City High School Girls Advocated Civil Rights 100 Years Ago

UMKC professor to sign book ‘Praising Girls: The Rhetoric of Young Women, 1895-1930’

Praising Girls CoverKANSAS CITY, MO – At the turn of the 20th century, ordinary Kansas City girls delivered extraordinary arguments for the rights of women, African Americans, and Native Americans. A new book by Henrietta Rix Wood, Ph.D., reveals how these high school students spoke out on important issues of their era. Wood, an assistant teaching professor in the Honors College at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, will sign her book Praising Girls: The Rhetoric of Young Women, 1895-1930 at a reception in her honor Thursday, May 5, from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. in Miller Nichols Library 325. Southern Illinois University Press published the book in February 2016.

Wood analyzed writing by young women of different races, classes and social statuses. Surveying school-sponsored publications of the period, she found that girls used epideictic rhetoric in newspaper editorials and articles, creative writing projects, yearbook entries and literary magazines. This type of rhetoric, typically oral, most often is employed in ceremonial situations such as speeches, sermons, and graduations. Leaders use it to motivate, blame, praise and forge solidarity. Unlike men of the time, young women had few chances to speak publicly, so they expressed their opinions in print. “The girls in my study intervened rhetorically in national and international discourses on class, race, education, immigration, racism and imperialism,” according to Wood. “They confronted the gender politics that denigrated young women and often deprived them of positions of authority.”

The book considers the published writing of girls at four Kansas City-area schools including privileged white girls at a college preparatory school, Native American girls at an off-reservation boarding school, black girls at a racially segregated public high school, and working- and middle-class girls at a large whites-only public high school. Wood examines how students educated readers about their culture and identity, and commented on historical events.

Wood also will sign a book she co-edited last year: In the Archives of Composition: Writing and Rhetoric in High Schools and Normal Schools, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2015.

“Students in the Honors College are privileged to learn from a researcher of Dr. Wood’s caliber,” says Jim McKusick, UMKC Honors College dean. “She is leading a national conversation on the use of epideictic rhetoric by marginalized groups.”

Wood earned an interdisciplinary doctorate in English and history at UMKC; a master’s degree in English from UMKC and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Her research focuses on the rhetoric and history of women in the U.S. Before beginning her graduate studies, Wood was a reporter for The Kansas City Star, and for a newspaper and city magazine in Dallas.
The Honors College is hosting Thursday’s reception. UMKC faculty, staff, students and the public are welcome to attend.

Written by Beth Hammock, UMKC Honors College Outreach Consultant