Lisa Je, a GERS scholar and a PhD candidate in Chemical & Biological Engineering, joins the UW-Madison chapter of the national Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society this academic year. Lisa is the 4th GERS scholar to be inducted into this prestigious honor society since 2010 when the UW-Madison chapter was established.
Lisa is the proud daughter of two immigrants living their American dream through Lisa’s education. As Lisa enters their final year in the Chemical & Biological Engineering Department at UW-Madison, they reflect on overcoming their previous obstacles. Despite lacking computational experience, they first joined Prof. Manos Mavrikakis’s group to study catalysis using computational calculations. However, it was only after they completed a master’s degree and left graduate school that they truly realized their passion for research. This drove them to co-author a Science paper (Science, 380, 70-76, 2023) based on their master’s work. With renewed determination, they successfully reapplied to the PhD program, was awarded the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, and now work with Prof. Reid Van Lehn and Prof. Victor Zavala. Their resilience in their PhD on computational materials has resulted in another publication (Current Opinion in Chemical Engineering, 36, 100796, 2022). Empowered by their unique PhD experience, they now strive to cultivate a research environment inclusive and welcoming for students of all identities. They do this by serving on the Chemical Engineering Graduate Student Association (ChEGS) and Graduate Engineering Research Scholars (GERS) in several roles over the past few years for outreach, mental health education, and recruiting to bring underrepresented undergraduate scholars across the nation to visit UW-Madison’s College of Engineering.
The Bouchet Society serves to recognize outstanding scholarly achievement, promote diversity and excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate, build a network of preeminent scholars, and foster environments of support for these scholars. Since the UW–Madison chapter formed in 2010, it has inducted 70 graduate students and postdocs into the ranks of Bouchet Scholars. Members must demonstrate the five qualities: character, leadership, advocacy for students traditionally underrepresented in the academy, service, and scholarship.
All five inductees will be celebrated at the Bouchet Graduate Honor Society Ceremony on December 2, 2024 from 4:30 – 6:00 PM at the Pyle Center (RSVP here).