2024 CLA Awards

The 2024 CLA Awards were held on Monday, April 8.  Congratulations to all of this year's award winners! 

2024 Outstanding Student Award Winners

Undergraduate

Graduate

2024 Outstanding Student Award Nominees

Undergraduate

Graduate

2024 Faculty and Staff Award Winners

Bios


Student Bios

Overholt
Monika Overholt
Mo Overholt is a BFA student at Middle Tennessee State University who lives in the greater Nashville area. Her work explores themes of Judaica, mental illness, and personal philosophy through the medium of printmaking. Mo has been recognized both locally and nationally, she has been awarded first place in a juried exhibition in 2022 for the “Festival of Veils” as well as MTSU’s Diversity scholarship that same year. Mo’s work has been exhibited at Haley Gallery in the Country Music Hall of Fame, Spectra Art Space in Denver, Colorado, Random Sample in Nashville, Tennessee, and FUN! 2023 Print Exchange Online Exhibition. Mo’s work has been published as cover art for Number Inc magazine, MTSU’s Collage magazine, and Polemical zine. Mo stays engaged with her local art community by teaching and attending workshops as well as being a member of the Boro Art Crawl and Rutherford Arts Alliance and Vice President of MTSU’s Print club, Tulip Poplar Press.

 

Foster
Caitlin Foster
Caitlin Foster is a senior majoring in Communication Studies, concentrating in Organizational Communication, and minoring in Leadership. Caitlin has held various professional internships including marketing and recruitment for the MTSU Communication Studies Department, human resources at Ulta Beauty, and corporate philanthropy at Jackson National Life Insurance. Caitlin has served as a mentor for the Liberal Arts Mentorship Program (LAMP) for two consecutive years, where she has invested in students’ leadership skills and academic abilities. She has continued these efforts by serving as the President of Lambda Pi Eta and the President of Communication Studies Club in 2022 and 2023. After graduating, Caitlin hopes to continue her work in corporate philanthropy as she finds joy in giving back to her local community.

 

Reiley
Jacqueline Reilly
Jacqueline Reilly is an undergraduate senior from Okemos, Michigan. She is an English major and writing minor. She is passionate about the art of fiction writing and won the 2022 English Department Peck Award as an undergraduate junior. She was chosen to represent MTSU for the 2023 Southern Literary Festival Writing Contest under the “short play” category and performed a staged reading of this play during MTSU’s 2023 Scholars Week. She also performed a reading of her flash fiction creative writing chapbook during MTSU’s 2024 Scholars Week. She’s conducted interviews and published blog posts for the English Department’s “In Process” event series for authors Brenda Cárdenas and Keith Pilapil Lesmeister before their visits to campus. She is a member of three different campus honor societies and has made the Dean’s/President’s List every semester of college. She is a student-athlete and plays for the women’s soccer team. She is also appointed as the SAAC representative for the women’s soccer team (Student-Athlete Advisory Committee).

 

Davenport
Jae Davenport
Jae Davenport is a senior honors student and Buchanan Fellow majoring in Global Studies with minors in International Relations and University Honors. They served last year as a student representative on the Honors Committee, helping form and approve new Honors College faculty and policy. They were elected and have served the past two years as Secretary of MTSU’s Japan Club, which has grown to over 70 active members during that time, including several Japanese exchange students and English language learners from the local Nashville ELS school. This semester Jae will be defending their research thesis hoping to better understand the Japanese community in Middle Tennessee. They currently work as a writing tutor at the University Writing Center on campus.


Lovitt
Opal Lovitt
Opal Lovitt is a non-traditional, first-generation college student living in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. She is a History major with a minor in Spanish. She has recently completed an internship with the Tennessee Holocaust Commission and is passionate about ensuring Holocaust remembrance and legacies. Opal loves being immersed in the world of academia and is set to return to MTSU for her MA in Public History in the fall, which is the next step in the pursuance of her PhD in History.

 

Prim
Connor Prim
Connor Prim is a junior Instrumental Music Education major with minors in University Honors and Secondary Education. He recently finished a research study funded by the Undergraduate Research Center entitled "From Bach to Bernstein: Integrating Classical Music into the Elementary Classroom," which he has presented at the music education associations of Iowa and Oregon and will soon present in California. He is fueled by a passion for helping young minds discover the joys of music at all grade levels and hopes to become an elementary music educator upon his graduation from MTSU.

 

Robinson
Elle Robinson
Elle Robinson (she/they) is a nontraditional student majoring in Philosophy and minoring in Political and Social Thought. Raised in Cookeville, TN, she received a B.S. in Psychology from Tennessee Technological University in 2011. After a decade living in the world, she enrolled at MTSU to pursue her passion for philosophical and social thought. Since the summer of 2022 she has been actively involved in political action, helping to found Cookeville Community Action, which operates as her hometown's Planned Parenthood Action Council, and has worked with the Campaign for Southern Equality pursuing justice for the transgender community, both roles being inspired and informed by her study of philosophy. She seeks to pursue a Ph.D. and enter the academy herself as a professor, as well as continue her political advocacy, in an attempt to both interpret the world and change it.

 

Ibrahim
Gina Ibrahim
Gina Ibrahim is an Egypt-born, Middle Tennessee-raised student with a passion for political theory and justice. She has taken on several MTSU courses to further her knowledge in law, culture, and economics. Her research endeavors have focused on constitutional law and philosophy, expanding her drive to look into the mechanisms of society. She graduated Magna Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science in Political Science.

 

Jones
Haley Jones
Haley Jones is a double-major in English and Public Writing and Rhetoric set to graduate in May 2024. She added on Public Writing and Rhetoric as a second major in Fall 2022 and has since worked to synthesize the skills involved in both majors, from critical thinking to learning how to adapt her writing to specific audiences. She presented a paper at the Tennessee Communication Association conference in 2023 and won the Top Undergraduate Student Paper award, and also received the Richard C. and Virginia Peck Award for 2023–24. She is now working with local nonprofit organizations and partners to put her writing skills to use in the community and prepare for a postgraduate career of nonprofit work. 

 

Jenkins
Danny Jenkins
Liadan “Danny” Jenkins is a senior Anthropology major with double minors in Leadership Studies and Honors Studies and an Honors Transfer Fellowship recipient. They were a tutor for the University Writing Center and a mentor in the Liberal Arts Mentoring Program. They are writing their honors thesis on their ethnographic research done while on a 5-month study-abroad trip to Brazil. They have also completed field schools in Brazil and Europe. They have attended and presented at regional, national, and international Anthropology conferences, are active in many anthropology-related organizations and associations and are a member of several national honor societies. They are inspired by the words "We must be the change we wish to see in the world."

 

Purcell
Logan Purcell
Logan Purcell is a junior Theatre major and has been an active member of the Theatre and Dance Department since he arrived as a freshman. He can often be found mentoring fellow students or touring perspective ones, on the stage, or working in the light booth.  He currently serves as the President of the Theatre Honor Society; APO, and this past summer Logan completed his first professional acting contract with the Cumberland County Playhouse in All Shook Up and Charlie and The Chocolate Factory! You may have seen him in one of the many productions in which he has performed at MTSU, including but not limited to, Company (Robert), The Tempest, Rabbit Hole (Howie), Sense and Sensibility (John Willoughby), and Fun Home (Roy / Pete / Mark / Bobby Jeremy).

 

Booher
Rachel Booher
Rachel Booher graduated in December 2023 with a BS in Foreign Language-Japanese, and minors in English, Global Studies, and Honors. She served as the chief editor of the Collage magazine and the Student Council President. She has been a member of Phi Kappa Phi since 2021, received a URECA grant, the Freeman Asia, Kiyoshi Kawahito Scholarship, and the Paul Martin Scholarship. While in Japan, she volunteered as an English language tutor at a Japanese elementary school. Her honors thesis, “Japanese Influences on the Haiku of Gary Snyder, with Six Original Poems,” looked critically at the influences of Japanese haiku on the American poetry by Gary Snyder. She has extended her thesis topic to a research project on ecopoetry, creating a path to environmental literacy, through the lens of literature. She will start the graduate program in English at MTSU in Fall 2024.  

 

Petrovich
Kylie Petrovich
Kylie Petrovich is an English Ph.D. Candidate at Middle Tennessee State University. She received a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh, a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Full Sail University, and a Master of Arts in English from Belmont University. Ms. Petrovich specializes in modern American literature, popular culture, and critical theory. She also enjoys creative writing and maintains an avid interest in psychology. Currently, Ms. Petrovich is working on her dissertation, which focuses on place-identity in the life and work of Edith Wharton.

 

Chavis
AnnaLevi Chavis
AnnaLevi Chavis is in her final semester as a Public History graduate student. She is working to become a public archaeologist and hopes to serve her hometown of Murfreesboro and the greater middle Tennessee area. While attending MTSU, AnnaLevi has served as the public history and archaeology lab manager where she curates and rehabilitates legacy collections and works with undergraduate students teaching curation care practices. AnnaLevi is passionate about the knowledge obtained from materials of the past and encourages others to ask questions of themselves and the things around them. In doing so, she believes more people will connect to our shared history and build a stronger community in our present.

 

Brown
Carly Brown
Originally from St. Louis, Missouri, Carly Brown began playing piano at the age of two, and violin at the age of eight. Before her years of missionary work, she spent her time serving as Concertmaster of the Belmont Symphony & Chamber Orchestras, playing concerts at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center, and studio recording in Nashville. Her violin has taken her around the world for concerts and festivals in NYC, LA, Disney World, the Czech Republic, and Germany. Dabbling in commercial and CCM bands, she’s opened for Eli Young Band and Kaycee Musgraves, toured with The Vigil Project, and performed with artists like Sarah Kroger and Sheryl Crow. She is currently pursuing her master’s degree from Middle Tennessee State University, holds the Concertmaster position of the MTSU Symphony and Chamber Orchestras, and substitutes for the Huntsville and Jackson Symphony Orchestras. She has been teaching privately for ten years. When she’s not playing violin, Carly enjoys any sport that gets her outside, reading in her hammock drinking quality coffee, golfing, and lake life at her family cabin in Wisconsin.

 

Ferris
Divinity Ferris
Divinity Ferris completed a Bachelor's in Business Administration at MTSU in 2021, graduating summa cum laude. Motivated by her love of other languages, cultures, and countries, Divinity chose to continue her education by enrolling in MTSU's International Affairs M.A. degree program. Over the next four semesters, Divinity excelled in her graduate courses while also assisting Dr. Sekou Franklin with his research on American civil rights movements. Having expressed an interest in a career in higher education, Divinity taught an online course in Introduction to Global Politics as her practicum experience, which she defended with distinction. She graduated in December 2023 with a 4.0 GPA. A month later, Divinity traveled to Seoul, Korea for an 8-week international business internship with Kamp Global. Divinity's future goals include returning to school to earn a doctorate and become a professor working and conducting research in East Asia.

 

Reece
McKenzee Reece
McKenzee Reece graduated in December 2023 with an M.A. in Sociology and certificate in WGST. Her research interests center around social inequalities. Her thesis, titled " Boys Love (Danmei) Fiction: A Critical Content Analysis of Heteronormativity and Performativity," focused on the ways in which heteronormativity and performativity were represented in Chinese web novels focusing on MxM relationships and how these representations are both a feminist movement and a LGBTQ+ movement that could be written and utilized in stronger ways both within and outside Mainland China. McKenzee will present her thesis findings at MTSU Scholar's Week under the title "Queering the Literature: Gender Performativity and Heteronormativity in Chinese Danmei Novels." She is currently teaching a course in Women and Gender Studies at MTSU. Her main career goal has always been to further her knowledge and abilities to contribute to changes in society no matter the size or scale, which was one of the reasons she was drawn to sociology.  Her hobbies are reading and listening to music.

 

Wood
Sarah Wood
Sarah Wood is a second-year graduate student in the MAT program with a concentration in Spanish. Sarah decided to learn Spanish at the age of 26 and started taking lessons with a private tutor in 2018. She gained proficiency quickly and her enthusiasm grew deeper. Sarah recently participated in a departmental recruitment visit to Blackman High School and was well-received by an auditorium of high school students. She is a Fulbright program finalist, and plans to do research and represent the USA in Colombia. Sarah is also a great actress and a great swimmer. She has put these skills into good use by teaching drama class and swimming lessons to both children and adults.

 

Buck
Valeri Buck
Valeri Buck is in her fifth semester as a Master of Arts in Liberal Arts (MALA) program student and a Graduate Teaching Assistant in the department of World Languages, Literatures, and Cultures teaching International Detective Fiction under the supervision of Dr. Joan McRae. She twice presented as a panelist with the EXL Institute and at the Tennessee Communication Association/Kentucky Communication Association (TCA/KCA) Joint Conference where she also placed in the top three graduate paper competition. Valeri studied abroad in Central Europe this past summer along with her daughter, who is also graduating from MTSU in May 2024. Valeri plans to continue integrating her passions of international experiences and her professional medical background to increase the depth and breadth of liberal arts programs.

 

Faculty and Staff Bios

Shouse
Lauren Shouse
Lauren Shouse is a director, dramaturg and teacher. She is currently the Assistant Professor of Theatre Directing at Middle Tennessee State University. Prior to that, she was the Associate Artistic Director at Chicago’s Northlight Theatre. At Nashville Repertory Theatre, Lauren has directed: Waitress (upcoming), POTUS (upcoming), The Cake, Every Brilliant Thing, Avenue Q; Rapture, Blister, Burn; Superior Donuts, and A Christmas Story. Her other recent directing credits in Chicago and Nashville include:  Something Clean, a Sideshow and Rivendell Theatre co-production, The Legend of Georgia McBride at Northlight Theatre, What We’re Up Against at Compass Theatre, The Cake at Rivendell Theatre (nominated for Chicago’s Joseph Jefferson Award for best director), A Doll’s House, Nice Girl and Betrayal at Raven Theatre. She has directed 5 productions for the MTSU Center Stage Series, and also worked with Street Theatre Company, 3P’s Productions and Ovvio Arte. Lauren’s international work includes: Production Executive for The Night of 1000 Voices (celebrating John Kander and Fred Ebb and starring Joel Grey with Avenue Q) at The Royal Albert Hall; Production Executive of An Evening with Michael Parkinson at The Theatre Royal - Windsor, Children’s Director/Assistant to the Director of A Gift of Music, and Assistant Director of The Night of 1000 Voices at The Odyssey Arena in Belfast, Ireland. Lauren holds an MA in Performance studies from the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill and her MFA in theatre directing from Northwestern University. www.LaurenShouseDirects.com

 

McCusker
Dr. Kristine McCusker
Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Kristine M. McCusker earned a Ph.D. in History, Folklore and Ethnomusicology from Indiana University in 2000. She has published Lonesome Cowgirls and Honky-Tonk Angels: The Women of Barn Dance Radio (Illinois, 2008) and co-edited, A Boy Named Sue: Gender and Country Music (Mississippi, 2004) and Country Boys and Redneck Women: New Essays in Gender and Country Music (Mississippi, 2016), which was given an honorable mention as Best Book of the Year by No Depression magazine. She also published multiple articles and book chapters that examine music as the outcome of historical change. Her new book is a National Institutes of Health/National Library of Medicine-funded book, Just Enough to Put Him Away Decent: Death Care, Life Extension and the Making of a Modern South, 1900-1955 (Illinois, 2023) She also recently published articles on musicians Bobbie Gentry and the Chicks. McCusker has contributed to multiple videos and documentaries, most recently "The Hayloft Gang" and "Facing the Laughter: Minnie Pearl," which were shown on PBS stations nationwide; on Lil Nas which appeared on NPT; and has worked with programs such as the Smithsonian's Museums on Main Streets program and the National Endowment of the Humanities/National Library Association grants program. Her most recent work, tentatively titled, "Yours For World Peace: Soldier Reinterment and the Rise of the Cold War," has already been awarded an MT-IGO award and a Non-Instructional Assignment.

 

Swart
Dr. Lisa Swart
Dr. Lisa Swart is a lecturer in the Department of History. She received her B.F.A from Rhodes University, South Africa, and completed her M.A. in Ancient Near Eastern Studies and Ph.D. in Ancient Studies at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. Since joining MTSU in 2016, she has taught in the READ/HISTORY program, an MTSU QEP that links Reading and U.S. history courses for students requiring additional literacy skills using high-impact teaching methods. She also teaches the U.S. History surveys for MTSU Online, and has supervised graduate-level directed readings in Ancient Egypt and the Ancient Near East. All her classes are certified M.T. Engage courses.

Upon completing the Academy of Teaching Excellence Faculty Fellow program in 2019, she was designated a Faculty Fellow. Committed to achieving equity and accessibility in the classroom, she transitioned all on-the-ground and online classes to OER through an OER grant in 2021-2022. Swart encourages her students to view the world through the historical lens, empowering them to recognize their ability to shape history. By blending intellectual and creative activities, she strives to make history relevant to their lives, urging them to engage with the past critically, analytically, and empathetically.

She currently serves as an A.I. Champion for the MTSU AI Initiative, leading seminars to targeted faculty and staff audiences throughout the university. She has presented at numerous national and international conferences, and has been published in leading Egyptological journals.

 

Ly
Dr. Aliou Ly
Aliou Ly has a BA in History from Cheikh Anta Diop University (Senegal), a master’s degree in history from California State University, Fullerton, and a Ph.D. in African history from the University of California Davis. He began his U.S. academic career as an Athletic Academic Advisor at CSUF. He then taught as an Adjunct at California State University, Sonoma, in 2011, before being appointed, in 2012, as Assistant Professor of History at Middle Tennessee State University. In 2016 Ly developed the MTSU Faculty-Led Education Abroad Program, “History in Senegal,” in his home country. Ly was promoted to Associate Professor in 2018. He served as Interim Director of the Africana Studies Program during the Spring of 2019, and as Vice-Chair and Chair of the MTSU General Education Committee for three years (2018-2021). Since the Fall of 2019, he has been the History Department Undergraduate Program Director.

Ly has published and presented widely. He specializes in the political history of Guinea Bissau, with a focus on the meaning of women's participation in national liberation struggles and anti-colonial movements. In this context, he examines the ambiguous relations between African national liberation movements and their feminine members’ movements for women’s rights and emancipation. For many years, he has practiced a research interest in the Haitian Revolution and the dissemination of the idea of this revolution throughout African political and intellectual circles. He is author of Women of the Portuguese Guinea Liberation War: De-Gendering the History of Anticolonial Struggle” Bloomsbury Publishing Company, UK. 2024

Among Ly’s awards are the MTSU Outstanding Teaching Award in General Education, and the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women for Curriculum Integration. During his tenure at MTSU, he has received a Congratulatory Letter from the Office of the President and three Congratulatory Letters from the Office of the Vice President for Student Affairs and Vice Provost for Enrollment and Academic service.

 

Dummons
Kimberly Dummons
Kimberly Dummons is an Associate Professor of Art and Design, teaching Two-Dimensional and Three-Dimensional Design in the Foundations area. Her work uses color, pattern, texture, and the female figure, in prints, collage, and sculpture to talk about place, both literally and figuratively. She has an active exhibition record, is included in several collections, both public and private, and has a public sculpture commissioned by the City of New Orleans, Buddy Bolden, in Louis Armstrong Park. She’s received grants to support her scholarly activities, including an Individual Artist Award from the Tennessee Arts Commission. She earned her M.F.A. in Studio Art, with a Sculpture concentration, from the University of New Orleans.

 

RileySousa
Dr. Ashley Riley-Sousa
Ashley Riley Sousa earned her BA in History from University of California, Davis before completing her MA, MPhil, and PhD in History from Yale University. Her work has appeared in the journal Ethnohistory, the Pacific Historical Review, and the Journal of Genocide Research as well as chapters in the edited volumes A Cultural History of Genocide: The Long Nineteenth Century, published by Bloomsbury and Violence and Indigenous Communities: Confronting the Past, Engaging the Present published by Northwestern University Press.

Alongside her scholarship, Dr. Sousa is also committed to engaging with audiences outside the classroom, appearing on several history podcasts (most notably, The Road to Now), radio programs, and giving interviews to newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times. She has consulted on historical role playing games and popular reference books, as well as giving talks at the Rutherford County Library and the Veterans Administration’s multicultural training sessions.

Since joining the faculty at MTSU, Dr. Sousa’s proudest accomplishments have been in her mentorship of students, especially the graduate students she has served as Graduate Director in the History Department since 2019. She has helped students establish history careers and advance to prestigious PhD programs, including the Public History PhD program here at MTSU. While weathering the pandemic, she has helped grow the History MA program and promote opportunities for History graduate students on campus and in the community.

 

Richardson
Suzi Richardson
Suzi Richardson is an Executive Assistant in the Department of Communication Studies. She earned her B.A. in History and Secondary Education from Olivet Nazarene University. She’s been married to Tom Richardson for 35 years, has four children, and 4 grandchildren. Her daughter Victoria also works for MTSU and is an Executive Assistant in the Department of History.

Before being employed by MTSU in early 2017, Suzi owned and operated her own successful roofing company. As a business owner, she honed her skills in branding and marketing, management, and customer service. The experience has served her well.

Suzi has been employed at MTSU for 7 years. She began in Undergraduate Admissions and Recruitment as a part of the Admissions team. Moving from Student Affairs to Academic Affairs in the fall of 2020, specifically to Comm Studies, she has embraced her connection with MTSU’s diverse and intercultural student population. Suzi has been privileged to be a part of many student-focused events that include the MTSU Homecoming Parade, student clubs, and recruitment activities. In her own words, “I love to connect with students! Watching them blossom to feel comfortable in their own skin and move toward becoming their own person keeps me young. Each student is a valuable piece of our future and we must protect that.”

Suzi is grateful for those who have encouraged and uplifted her--including her family, Dr. Mary Beth Asbury (Communication Studies Chair), COMM faculty, and the countless students who continue to inspire her.