CAS Story Hub

Knowing malice beyond the pale

Pete Simi’s mother wanted him to understand racism, so when he was 9, they watched a PBS documentary on the Ku Klux Klan. Here’s how he remembers one Klansman who was interviewed. “He spoke with such passion, anger, such strong emotion. And it just struck me, as a young child, trying to understand what was […]

A mother’s microbial gift

Old assumptions about human breast milk are giving way to new thinking about microbes in milk and their role in children’s health and our immune systems. It happened again, most recently at a conference in Prague. After she gave her talk, a scientist came up to Shelley McGuire, a pioneer exploring the microbial communities found […]

Student poets get creative tips from the top

Dozens of poetry-minded WSU students took the opportunity to learn firsthand about creative writing from Washington state’s top poetry advocate in two recent events at WSU Pullman. In “Ask a Poet/Write a Poem” held in the Bundy Reading Room, Tod Marshall, Washington’s poet laureate, led students in exercises for cultivating creativity and nurturing the poetic […]

Categories: CAS Story Hub, English

German double major selected as a Rhodes Scholar finalist

Ryan Summers graduated from WSU on December 9 with a sensational resume: a first degree in computer engineering, a soon-to-be completed second degree in German, his name on a patent, selection as a Rhodes Scholar finalist, numerous awards for outstanding scholarship and undergraduate research, and a 4.0 GPA. The 22-year-old has also completed an international […]

Artist sculpts future with past

Senior fine arts major Victoria De Leon meanders through campus from Stevens Hall to Southside Café. She builds her own soup in the dining hall and proceeds to a table in the back near the windows. From her backpack, she removes a black sketchbook that is falling apart at the spine. She sifts through the […]

Faculty invigorate classrooms, save students money

English instructor Kate Watts cringes when she imagines students shelling out upwards of $80 for a textbook. She had the same reservations many faculty members have about free, open-sourced, online material. But she did her research, asked experts, consulted with colleagues, and found solutions to save her students money. The online textbook Watts uses in […]

Campus involvement empowers first-generation, non-traditional student to soar

WSU Tri-Cities alumnus Geoff Schramm never thought he would go to college. Coming from a family where no one before him in his family had gone to college, he said it was sort of a family tradition that he goes straight into the workforce after high school. “That’s just what you did in my family,” […]

Chemists develop novel dye for bio-imaging

Washington State University scientists have created an injectable dye that illuminates molecules with near-infrared light, making it easier to see what is going on deep inside the body. The new dye will help medical researchers track the progression of a wide array of diseases, such as cancer.

Master’s student blends overseas research, local outreach

Passionate about plants and nearing graduation with a master’s in cultural anthropology, Amanda Thiel has traveled overseas for her research and educated elementary school children about botany. Thiel went to rural Guatemala in the summer of 2016 to research ethnobotany, the study of how people use plants in their region. During her two-month stay, she […]

Biology graduate earns internship at PNNL, working to combat cancer

Vincent Danna (’17) was in middle school when he lost all of his hair. He suffers from a condition known as alopecia universalis, which is when the immune system mistakenly attacks the hair follicles. His personal struggle led him to want to become a dermatologist and help those who experience serious skin diseases and other […]