Office of the Provost Awards:                      

• Dr. Cara Delay has received Provost’s Research Competition Track Three Funding in the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences 2025-2026 for: Abortion in America: A New Pre-Roe History. 
• Dr. Rebecca Janzen was awarded the 2026 Russell Research Award for Humanities and Social Sciences. 

• Dr. Agnes Mueller was awarded the 2026 Carolina Trustees Professorship in Humanities, Social Sciences, Business and Law. 

• Dr. Leah McClimans has received Provost’s Reearch Competition Track Three Funding in the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences 2025-2026 for: Asking Questions: A Philosophy of Discovery. 

McCausland Faculty Fellowship

The McCausland Faculty Fellowship is the premier faculty fellowship program in the McCausland College of Arts and Sciences. It supports early-career McCausland College of Arts and Sciences faculty who are committed, creative teachers and rising stars in their academic disciplines.

• Two WGST Faculty Affiliates, Drs. Kaitlyn Boyle and Tharini Viswanath, were recipients of the 2026 McCausland Faculty Fellowship. Learn more about their work via the link above. 

Conferences & Presentations:  

• Dr. Loron Benton: 

• • Moderated a panel at WGS South: “Intersecting Interventions--A BIPOC & Student Caucus Panel.”

• • Presented a paper entitled "Dear Fellow-Citizen:" Modjeska Monteith Simkins, Black Women's Leadership, and the Power of Letter Writing" at the Black Women’s Studies Association symposium. 

• Dr. Julia Elliott’s story collection Hellions was shortlisted for the Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, which celebrates work by women and nonbinary writers from the US  and Canada. 
• WGST Student Mary Grace Labarowski successfully defended her Honors thesis: "Speak Until the People Gain a Voice: Political Consciousness and Community Accountability Among Black Women in the South Carolina Legislature". 

• Dr. Kathryn Luchok:  

• • Led the inaugural WGST Brown Bag Lunch in April: Other Voices and Homebirth in South Carolina During Covid-19 and Beyond. 

• • Was invited by the USC Maternal Health Equity Project, an advocacy and educational committee within the club Gamecocks Universities Allied for Essential Medicine (GUAEM) to speak their end-of-year symposium to spread awareness about the maternal health equity. 

• Dr. Emily Mann: 

• • Presented “Contested Perspectives on Biomedical Risk Management of Pregnancy at Advanced Maternal Age” at the mini conference on reproduction at the Eastern Sociological Society annual meeting in Washington, DC. She was also a co-organizer of the mini conference. 

• • Gave an invited talk in the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Michigan on reproductive justice and research methods. 

• Dr. Allison Marsh 

• • Presented “The Pioneering Women of Electrical Engineering” during a web event for the IEEE History Center as part of IEEE History Week in October. 

• • Gave a short talk “The Electrifying World of Benjamin Franklin” for the SC 250 exhibit at the South Carolina State Fair. 

• • Took 15 Honors College students to Washington D.C. in February for Museum Advocacy Day. 

• • Spoke for the USC chapter of Alpha Chi Omega: “The Pioneering Women of Electrical Engineering.”  

• • Participated in a roundtable discussion, “Current Politics of Research, a Roundtable Discussion,” at the Society for the History of Technology annual meeting. 
• Dr. Leland Spencer presented at the Southern States Communication Association conference in Birmingham, AL (top paper in gender studies). 
• Dr. Kathryn Luckhok and WGST Graduate Certificate alum Elizabeth Collins presented on Homebirth in South Carolina During COVID-19 and Beyond at the SC Public Health Association (SCPHA) Conference in Columbia. 

Awards & Honors 

• Dr. Angela Acosta received a Walker Institute International Conference Grant to attend the Modernist Studies Association conference at Loughborough University in July 2026. She will present a talk on female Spanish surrealist art titled “Witchy Surrealism: Delhy Tejero’s ‘Las Brujas’ Drawings and Los Cuadernines Diaries" and chair the session "Genre/Gender Bending Speculative World Literature." 

• Dr. Frances Ashe-Goins was honored with a Certificate of Excellence and recognition as "OWN IT! Magazine's Top Women Leading in Excellence, Authority, Authenticity, Influence and Legacy. She is featured in the 2025 special edition of the magazine. 

• Dr. Dawn Campbell has successfully completed the McCausland College of Arts and Sciences Career Champion Certification Program. 

• Dr. Julia Elliott’s latest book, Hellions, was a finalist for the Southern Book Prize in fiction, an award nominated by booksellers across the South and sponsored by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance. 

• Dr. Kathryn Luchok attended the American Public Health Association Conference in November. For the Women's Caucus, she moderated the session: Brief but Powerful: Global and Intersectional Perspectives on Women's Mental Health. She also presented in an oral roundtable the work she and WGST Graduate Certificate holder Elizabeth Collins have been doing: Voices of Birth: What homebirth participants tell us about improving maternity care.     

• Dr. Allison Marsh: 

• • Has been named to the Humanities & Social Justice Advisory Committee for the Wiki Education Foundation. 

• • Has been awarded the 2026-27 Presidential Fellowship in Bibliography from the Linda Hall Library. 

• Dr. Sarah Rogers was a recipient for the 2025 Garnet Apple Award for Teaching Innovation, recognizing her commitment to advancing student learning through creative and impactful teaching practices. 

• Dr. Leland Spencer was awarded “Scholar of the Year” from the Religious Communication Association and delivered the keynote address at the annual awards banquet in November. 

Kudos:

• Dr. Dawn Campbell has been selected to teach the COLA 390 Summer Internship course for the McCausland College of Arts and Sciences’ new Summer Internship program in its inaugural year. 

• Dr. Leland Spencer served as president for the annual meeting of the Organization for the Study of Communication, Language, and Gender, in Memphis, TN.