Library Undergraduate Research Award

Congratulations to the 2023 Award Winners:

The Birds and the Bees Team ( Cassie Blake, Avery Munn, Samantha Rojas, & Maren Rule)

Aashna Nilawar

The Birds and the Bees

Abstract: Talking to their kids about sex and sexual health can be an awkward and nerve-wracking experience for many parents and guardians. Making these conversations open, supportive, and safe spaces can help decrease a child's risky sexual behavior, make them more likely to practice contraception, and can help foster a trusting relationship with their parent(s) or guardian(s). The team of Cassie Blake, Avery Munn, Samantha Rojas, & Maren Rule created a Birds and the the Bees website to share information about how to talk to a child. One of their priorities was to highlight the importance of starting sexual health education at a young age and gradually introducing more complex information as children grow older. They accomplished this by organizing their site by age groups (3-7, 8-12, 13+). Underlying their website is extensive research gleaned from library databases such as PubMed and Internet sites such as Planned Parenthood and the Trevor Project. In their research essay team members noted that "Planned Parenthood provided general information about how to talk about various sexual health topics, and websites like The Trevor Project gave us a better idea of how to tailor sex education to specific LGBTQ+ groups." The website also offers links to further resources such as state laws regarding sex education in schools. 

According to Professor Michele Parker, the website grew out of a "quarter-long team project where students created a media dissemination piece on a topic of their choice to a target population of their choice. The main goal of the assignment was to learn how to condense scientific literature and communicate it to the general public." The review committee for the Undergraduate Research Award believes this team of students did an outstanding job fulfilling this charge. They were impressed with the quality of the research that underlays the project, the scaffolding of information appropriate for different ages, and the links to further resources. In addition, the team did not shy away from challenging topics such as contraception, sexual diseases, or the unique sexual health needs of LGBTQ+ children. Professor Parker concluded her letter of support by noting "their hard work, project management, and seamless teamwork created a wonderful product for parents who are nervous to discuss sex with their children." Committee members heartily agree with this conclusion and believe Cassie Blake, Avery Munn, Samantha Rojas, & Maren Rule are very deserving of this award. Congratulations!

The Myth of Meritocracy: The Indian Caste System's Effect on Indian Immigration and Naturalization in the Early 20th Century United States

The Myth of Meritocracy explores the impact of the Indian caste system on immigration and naturalization in the United States from the 1910s to 1940s primarily and secondarily investigates the effects of the 1965 U.S. immigration reforms on South Asian immigrants. In addition to the obstacles faced by all Asian immigrants, South Asian immigrants faced unique challenges tied to their caste that influenced their immigration and naturalization experiences. To bypass early 20th-century racial restrictions to naturalization, South Asian immigrants argued that caste, Aryan ancestry, and their colonial subjecthood made them akin to “free white persons” outlined in U.S .naturalization law and they should, therefore, be granted a pathway to citizenship. Ultimately these efforts to evoke "whiteness" failed.

The author used a wide range of resources to support her argument. As Aashna Nilawar explained in her research essay for this award, she "conducted a comprehensive study of diverse primary sources. This included an examination of Hindu scriptures to understand the religious origins of the caste system, census records to gain insights into the demographic classification of individuals with South Asian heritage, and Supreme and local court cases to explore South Asians' challenges to race-based exclusionary policies and the efforts to weaponize caste distinctions to claim whiteness. Additionally, newspaper clippings from the period were analyzed to offer a timely perspective in the attitudes surrounding South Asian immigration." In her letter of support, Professor Sonia Gomez emphasizes the value of this research by writing that "Nilawar’s work is a significant analysis of the process of racialization for upwardly mobile immigrant groups. South Asians, specifically Indian-Americans, are at once excluded and included, which has had profound effects on their sense of identity, political values, and relationship to the American racial hierarchy." She added that this is "a well-researched, well-written, and valued contribution to U.S. immigration history." The Undergraduate Research Award review committee concurs in this conclusion. Committee members were very impressed with the quality and depth of her research and believe she is richly deserving of this award. Congratulations Aashna!

Congratulations to the 2024 Award Winners:

Nadine Koochou and Bryce Akira Nishikawa!

Nadine Koochou - On Marriage, Children, and Other Expectations: The Feminist Absurd in Rachel Cusk’s Outline

Introduction: 

Told through a series of conversations between the narrator and the people she meets during a work trip to Athens, Rachel Cusk’s Outline is a commentary on the ways in which we attempt to find meaning in our lives. To exemplify this, Cusk takes on a passive narrative style: other characters tell their stories, and the narrator, Faye, reports them back to us. However, even more significant than the narrative techniques are the stories revealed to us through Faye’s perspective. Cusk’s novel features a cast of characters who seem to have a shared understanding of the inherent meaninglessness of life. What differentiates the characters from one another is that they are in various stages of denial or acceptance of this concept. 

In this article, I argue that all of the characters in the novel are grappling with the absurdist idea that life lacks any inherent meaning, that the universe is God-less and without empathy. Thus, the characters try, to varying degrees of success, to create their own sense of meaning in life. This philosophical questioning is especially exemplified by the ambivalent stance the characters take towards supposedly sacred structures in society, such as marriage and childrearing. In doing so, Cusk writes a novel that joins theories of feminism and absurdism, suggesting that because of the condition of the patriarchy, marriage and parenthood alone cannot bring fulfillment and are therefore inadequate structures with which to inscribe meaning to the world. 

According to Professor Michele Burnham, "This article was Nadine’s final project for that course, and it offers a sophisticated literary analysis of the contemporary novel Outline by Rachel Cusk. The article is informed by robust research, exceptional critical and textual analysis, and integrative interdisciplinary thinking." The review committee for the Undergraduate Research Award heartily agrees with this statement. We were impressed with Nadine's excellent description of her research process - including stumbling blocks and finding solutions to these problems. We appreciated the way that Nadine provided evidence and support for the claims she made in the article. Professor Burnham sums up how the committee felt: "she has written a convincing and engaging analysis of the text, using evidence from the novel." Congratulations Nadine!

Bryce Akira Nishikawa - Diversity Requirements: An Analysis of Policy and Interpersonal Interactions at Santa Clara University

Abstract: 

Higher education diversity courses bring students of all backgrounds into a shared space to focus on the experiences of institutionally excluded or underrepresented communities. At Santa Clara University (SCU), calls for increased efforts to promote diversity are spearheaded by an interest in increasing the diversity course policy from one to two mandated courses. Through the conducting of 11 semi-structured interviews with faculty and students and short-term longitudinal surveys in 3 sections of diversity courses, this study seeks to understand the strengths and limitations of existing policies on diversity initiatives and where future efforts should be concentrated. Community members indicated strong support for the second diversity course policy with three additional goals in mind: remedy performative diversity from the administration, nurture deeper takeaways from courses, and ensure diversity is upheld beyond the classroom. Existing diversity courses provided a glimpse of the additional time and resources necessary to make SCU a welcoming environment for all identities. To achieve this goal, students, faculty, and administrators must invest more time and resources into diversity initiatives and building cross-boundary interpersonal relationships.

The review committee was impressed with the variety of research methods that Bryce incorporated into this project. According to Professor Jesica Fernandez, "Bryce’s project is ambitious in its scope as it combined varied qualitative research methods, specifically primary and secondary data sources from surveys to interviews to archival records of student activists and organizing at SCU."  We were particularly impressed at his usage of archival records to provide context and information about his research topic. We all agree it was an interesting study and we appreciated the opportunity to read it. Working in higher education allows us to see students original research and we second Professor Fernandez's statement: "As an educator I take great pride in students who take the initiative to want to make a change in society, and who are committed to justice. Bryce upholds these values...". Congratulations Bryce!