Kudos to these faculty, staff and programs.
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- NAU-Yuma and Arizona Western College were recognized as one of the top three partnerships in cohort three of the Aspen-AASCU Transfer Student Success Intensive, which tasks teams of community colleges and four-year institutions with developing plans to improve transfer student outcomes. The team’s strategy included expanding the Yuma Educational Success (YES) Program and enhancing dual enrollment opportunities in both schools.
- Catherine Harpst, an assistant clinical professor in the College of Nursing, was a recipient of the 2025 Deborah E. Trautman Future Nurse Leader Scholarship. The award recognizes graduate nursing students, chosen from a competitive pool of applicants, who are emerging leaders in nursing academia. As one of the chosen winners, Harpst earned $3,500 and an opportunity to attend a virtual conference with national nursing leaders.
- The NAU Foundation Board was one of five higher education governing boards that earned the 2025 John W. Nason Award for Board Leadership. This award is presented to higher education governing boards demonstrating exceptional leadership and initiative.
- Fred DeMicco, professor in the School of Hotel and Restaurant Management, co-authored the opinion article “An Innovative and Strategic Model for Health and Well-Being Travel to Enhance Comfort of Older Travelers,” published on Hospitality.net. The article promotes Florida Medical Tourism’s strategic model for health and wellness, arguing centuries-old natural therapies and proper nutrition could hold the secret to combating late-stage chronic pain.
- NAU Mock Trial broke several records this invitational season, including most individual awards won and most teams sent to the most tournaments, with seven teams attending three tournaments this fall and returning with seven individual awards. The group also saw its first team trophy placement when captain Ryan Roberts and members Vance Lambert, Meeah Rhodes, Veronica Summers, Ethan Ward, Jesse West and Mason Wulbrecht placed second at the Denver Duels Invitational. Other individual award winners include Tatum Ross, Hannah Thomas and Samuel Van Nuys.
- Astronomy and Planetary Science (APS) doctoral student Shaelyn Raposa was the first author of the article “Deriving the N2–CO Binary Phase Diagram Using Experimental Techniques and Thermodynamics,” published in The Planetary Science Journal. The paper, which looks at how carbon monoxide and nitrogen mix and change phases, includes doctoral student Cece Thieberger, alumna Anna Engle, APS professor Steve Tegler, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry associate professor Gerrick Lindberg and Astrophysical Ice Lab adjunct faculty Will Grundy and Jennifer Hanley as co-authors.
- APS graduate research assistant Laura Lee was quoted in the Space.com article “Food grows better on the moon than on Mars, scientists find,” following her research poster presentation at the 2024 American Geophysical Union (AGU). At the AGU meeting, Lee presented her work growing agricultural plants in regolith soil simulants, which she completed with Regents’ professor Nancy Johnson from the School of Earth and Sustainability.
- Undergraduate students Cassie Beaumont and Noah Fernandez, who both study physics and astrophysics, gave oral presentations at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Washington, D.C. This is the largest meeting of professional astronomers held each year.
- APS postdoctoral scholar Ben McKeeby was the first author of the article “Quantifying lava surface heterogeneity on Mars using THEMIS brightness temperature data,” published in Icarus. The study aims to quantify the temperatures and roughness of igneous rocks on Mars and correlate them to past lava flows, a task historically difficult due to dust deposition obscuring the planet’s observable features.
- Di Wu, an associate teaching professor for the Department of Global Languages and Cultures, received a grant from the American Short-Term Study in China Initiative to support NAU’s summer study abroad program in Chongqing, China. The scholarship will cover all tuition, boarding and medical insurance costs for involved students.
- School of Earth and Sustainability associate research professor Helen Rowe and her team have earned funding to organize three workshops around fire management and adaptation in the Sonoran Desert. Fire managers and other stakeholders will participate in a series of three workshops over the next two years, with the first being planned for April. Each workshop will focus on exploring the impacts of various potential fire management strategies, evaluating existing ones and developing updated implementation and monitoring plans.
- NAU’s chapter of the Blue Key Honor Society won three awards at the organization’s national student leadership conference in January: the Outstanding Chapter Award, which recognizes chapters whose actions and activities promote leadership, scholarship and service; the President’s Award, which celebrated the dedication of NAU Blue Key Honor Society President Karli VanderMeersch; and the Outstanding Advisor Award, which was given to NAU Honors College assistant director Glenn Hansen for his 25 years of society involvement.