Department of Physics Undergraduates Awards
Andrew Leister, Class of 2009, receives the Don Edward Harrison Jr. Award for Excellence in Physics
This prize is awarded each year to the senior with the highest demonstrated achievement in physics. It is based on the entire academic record, preliminary oral and written presentations of senior research, and letters of recommendation.
Andrew, who hales from Northern Virginia, is majoring in both physics and mathematics. When not working on his honors thesis project, which involves building a large neutrino detector for Fermilab in Chicago, he plays the clarinet in various musical groups on campus. He will be heading to a physics PhD program at Yale University next year.
Francesca Fornasini and Virginia Forstall, Class of 2010, share the E. Gary Clark Memorial Scholarship
This award is an annual scholarship given to a rising senior with a concentration in physics who has demonstrated an outstanding aptitude for the study of physics. Francesca comes from Maryland and is majoring in physics and English.
Virginia comes from Northern Virginia and is majoring in physics and mathematics. Both Francesca and Virginia have risen to every challenge in their coursework, have emerged unscathed from the slings and arrows of quantum physics, electromagnetism or electronics, and have through clever determination achieved academic perfection to the extent allowed by the third law of thermodynamics.
