EC Scholars Receive Awards From PKP, ECU’s Most Distinguished Honors Society

EC Scholars represented #ECUHonors as this year’s Phi Kappa Phi Outstanding First Year Student, Outstanding Senior, and Pierce Graduate Fellowship award recipients! Congratulations to Grace Krell, Arvind Rajan, Madie Fleishman, and Glenesha Berryman—read on to get a glimpse of what they have managed to accomplish during their time at ECU.

Co-outstanding First-Year Student is Grace Krell from the College of Engineering and Technology. Grace is an engineering major with minors in music and mathematics. She was a 2018 honor graduate of West Forsyth high school. A member of the honors college and an EC scholar, Grace is an avid classical and jazz musician as well as a small business owner. Recently she was named 2nd place winner in the Pirate Entrepreneurship Challenge. She pitched her product, the SweetSip stainless steel straw, and will use the prize money to invest in her business and supply these straws through Dowdy Student stores. Grace is also active as a volunteer with the Society of Women Engineers, the Biomedical Engineering Society, the Engineering Ambassadors, the ECU Wind Ensemble, and as a mentor at the local Boys and Girls club and volunteer at the Ronald McDonald House.

Outstanding First-Year Student, is Arvind Rajan from the Harriot College of Arts and Science. Arvind is an EC scholar and member of the Honors College pursuing a double major in chemistry and biochemistry. A graduate of Enloe Magnet high school in Raleigh, Arvind joined the Medical Bioscience Academy and led a team to develop CPRonDemand, a user-friendly mobile app that serves as a real-time guide for CPR. His goal is to become a surgeon and he conducting laboratory research with faculty members in the Brody School of Medicine on the role of fatty acid oxidation in muscle function using mice. This summer he will do further research at the Asian Institute of Medicine, Science and Technology in Malaysia. He is a member of the ECU Martial Arts Club, enjoys photography and is volunteer chair for ECU’s Alpha Epislon Delta Pre-professional honor society. He has also organized volunteer events for the Ronald McDonald House and the Benevolence Corp.

Outstanding Senior Award is Madeline Fleishman from the Harriot College of Arts and Sciences. Madie is completing a triple major in political science, security studies and international studies with a concentration in conflict. She is an EC scholar and member of the honor’s college. Her senior honor’s thesis examines the impacts of humanitarian aid on conflict situations and factors that worsen the outcomes. She was completing an internship at the UK Parliament in 2017 when a terrorist drove his car into pedestrians. This event impacted her desire to develop policies to improve security at home and abroad. She undertook community-engaged research with the Interfaith Refugee Ministry of New Bern, learning the stories of refugees who have resettled in the area and working to correct community misunderstandings of them. She has also been involved with multiple organizations including Chi Omega sorority, The EC Scholars’ governing body, Roundtable, the ECU Honors college recruitment team, the ECU office of global affairs, and the ECU Rural Prosperity Initiative. Madie will pursue a PhD in political science next year at the University of Maryland.

The 2019 Eldean Pierce Graduate Fellowship winner Glenesha Berryman of the Harriot College of Arts and Sciences. Glenesha is an EC Scholar and member of the honors college majoring in English and the interdisciplinary Great Books program. Glenesha studied abroad with an ECU program in Cuba, and participated in the Duke Feminist Theory workshop and UNC’s Global Africana Conference on Feminism and Sexuality in Global Black Communities. For Glenesha, the highlight of her college career was a summer research experience through the Columbia University Leadership Alliance Mellon Initiative at their Institute for African American Research. That summer she wrote and presented her own project on Black cultural productions as acts of survival and resistance. This year she started her own radio show at ECU on WZMB titles “A Seat in the Booth.” She invites artists, activists and scholars to engage in discussion about contemporary topics. Her senior honor’s project is collection of creative nonfiction essays in which she weaves Black and Chicana feminist theory, memoir and personal artifacts to tell her coming of age story. She received an Undergraduate Research Award to help fund this project. She too has extensive community service work including founding the Black History month lecture series, delivering MLK keynote addresses in the community, tutoring ESL students, and coordinating an after school literacy program. This fall she will enter the PhD program in the American Culture Department at the University of Michigan. She will also represent ECU in the national fellowship competition.