SENIOR COHORT

Frances Garnett

Liberal Arts Honors/International Relations & Global Studies
Fine Arts/Theater & Dance

Despite the challenges that my junior year brought, I’m proud that I spent this past year revisiting my old passions. As always, I’m incredibly grateful for the Dedman community. I honestly can’t thank them enough for being like a wonderful, encouraging family to me.

In the fall of 2019, I taught mime and mask workshops to my peers and high-schoolers at a regional theater conference. I studied mime in high school (which might be the nerdiest thing about me) and I didn’t realize how much I missed it. I also revisited my passion for singing. I get horrible stage fright, but I faced my fear by performing in the theater department’s production of Spring Awakening and in a masterclass in New York City for a casting director. Academically, I found out that I love anthropology when I took a class with my Dedman mentor, Dr. Amy Weinreb; and I brushed up on my French and explored how second-language speakers can create an authentic identity in a new language. I even found a unique acting gig through the Dell Medical School as a standardized patient, where I help nursing and medical students practice their diagnostic and interpersonal care skills.

Studying abroad in Brussels, Belgium, the spring of 2020 was a dream come true. I wanted to go somewhere I knew nothing about and where I could speak French. Through the Institute for Field Education, I was fully immersed in French, and I learned about the history, politics, and arts of Belgium (and that Belgian fries are superior to all others). I interned at a local theater company, Les Riches Claires, where I discovered that theater people there are just as bubbly and welcoming as in the US. Although it was difficult to keep up in a fully-French work environment, it was just what I needed to push myself further toward bilingualism. Although my time in Brussels was cut short, I was able to continue my studies remotely by writing a capstone paper about the representation of gender violence in contemporary Belgian theater – all in French, which was incredibly difficult, but I’m proud that I got through it! I documented my time there as a Global Ambassador social media representative and blogger for UT, and I loved being able to share my love for Brussels and reflect on what study abroad meant to me.

This summer, I’m so thankful that my family and I are all healthy and I can use this time in quarantine to continue working on my language and artistic skills. I volunteer at Casa Marianella, an organization in East Austin that helps displaced immigrants, where I use my French to help residents apply for jobs and navigate medical appointments. As part of my plan to become a more self-driven artist, I’m taking a screenwriting class through the RTF department where I’m writing a TV show “bible” and pilot episode. I’m also learning about artistic development and fundraising as a member of the executive committee for the 2021 Cohen New Works Festival, where we just distributed grants to students for summer research and development of their projects. Although my senior year won’t look anything like I expected, I know the Dedman community will serve as my rock as I navigate what it means to be an artist and scholar in a social distanced world.

As I reflect back on the 2019-2020 academic year, I’m filled with gratitude for the opportunities and support, both financial and otherwise, that the Dedman Scholars Program has provided. DDSP has given me the financial freedom to research, travel, and be highly involved at UT. It has also introduced me to some of my closest friends. The weekly meetings have supported me through my highs and my lows, encouraging me to be not just the best scholar, but the best person, I can be. I look forward to another year spent with the Dedman community, regardless of the shape it will take next fall.

Ray Kitziger

Plan II/Business Honors

Despite these uncertain times as summer 2020 begins, I am very happy to have completed my Junior year at UT. I feel like I’ve grown up during this past year. This feeling could perhaps be due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but my coursework and extracurricular involvement had facilitated my personal growth in a variety of ways as well. This past fall, I enjoyed a diverse course load, including Plan II, chemistry, and business courses. In addition to my classes, I continued with my involvement with UT Men’s Club Soccer, Texas 4000 for Cancer, and research enrollment at the UT Health Austin musculoskeletal institute. While the Longhorns’ football season was a bit disappointing, I couldn’t help but be happy with the success of my home-state LSU Tigers.

The spring semester was shaping up to be my favorite semester in college before the world came crashing down due to the virus. I had begun researching for my Plan II thesis and was ramping up training for my summer bike ride to Alaska before we were sent home for the rest of the semester. Despite the changes, I devoted most of my free time outside of classes to researching or riding a stationary bike. While the summer ride to Alaska was cancelled, we pivoted as an organization and created a “virtual ride” to honor our donors, hosts, and grant recipients and persevere in the fight against cancer.

Even without the trip to Alaska, this coming summer will be quite busy for me. I am currently working on my med school applications and continuing to research with my thesis advisor. I am looking forward to biking a ton on my own in the coming months and joining the 2021 Texas 4000 team so that I can spread hope, knowledge, and charity in the fight against cancer across the US and Canada. As cliché as it may sound, these past few months have embodied the old adage “when life gives you lemons…” I’ve done my best to stay happy, sane, and thankful for the blessings in my life. I’m looking forward to my senior year, whatever form it may be in, and am excited to tie up some loose ends before moving onto the next chapter of my life. Here’s to making lemonade.

Grace Leake

Plan II/Business Honors Program

Junior year passed quickly, but happily. This year, I practiced cultivating my own happiness, especially in the midst of a pandemic. I leaned into hobbies I love but haven’t taken the time for in college, like writing, cooking, and exercise. I grew more adept at identifying and appreciating blessings in daily life, no matter how banal, as well as giving myself space for rest. I hope to carry this mindset into a senior year that looks increasingly unpredictable and ungrounded.

In the fall of 2019, I travelled to Pamplona, Spain to deliver a paper and was amused when everyone thought I was a professor. Turns out, perception really is just about presentation (or maybe I just look old? Who knows). I also felt the satisfaction of seeing my first academic piece published.

Closer to home, I became active in Design for America, a student organization that uses design thinking to tackle problems in the greater Austin area. In the fall, I co-led a team that worked with the Austin YMCA to improve lifeguard recruitment and retention. In the spring, I returned to design solutions for flagging youth engagement at the YMCA, answering the question: how do we give young people the tools they need to become change-makers? I relished the chance to work on real-world problems, especially with an organization as community-oriented as the YMCA.

I enjoyed serving as the Plan II social chair this year. It felt like a chance for me to give back to a community that I love, as well as learn the ins and outs of event planning. I pursued my interests in athletics, continuing to play for my intramural soccer team and joining Texas Women’s Rugby. Needless to say, I’ve collected a lot of bruises this year.

In the academic arena, I added a creative writing certificate, which ended up being one of my best college decisions so far. I loved having the chance to meet like minded creatives, and I noticed a vast improvement in my fiction after my courses. One of the stories I wrote for class won the James F. Parker fiction prize at UT, which felt very validating, especially because I’ve always been quite reluctant to share my writing.

Although my internship was cancelled this summer of 2020 due to Covid19, I’m looking forward to an enjoyable, if slower, pace of life. I’m teaching a literature class to high school students and taking a Spanish class, as well as working on research and developing a creative writing piece in collaboration with the Good Systems project at UT.

Thanvi Thodati

Plan II/Neuroscience

My junior year was defined by movement. On several occasions, I was somewhere I had always dreamed of. At other times, I found myself in places that I hadn’t anticipated.

I spent the fall of 2019 in the UK, studying at University College London as an affiliate neuroscience student. For a lifelong Austinite, this was a highly anticipated adventure. I explored beautiful cities, from Edinburgh to Prague, walked through as many Christmas Markets as I could, and always looked forward to new food in new places. England put me on the path to becoming a tea snob, and I’ve developed a relentless craving for clotted cream and scones. I watched The Merry Wives of Windsor at Shakespeare’s Globe, saw Les Misérables on the West End, frequented the Wellcome Collection, and just reveled in the magic of public transportation.

At University College London, I finished up my neuroscience degree requirements, taking classes related to mental health and substance abuse. Through an elective, UCL also introduced me to medical anthropology. The course provided a framework for thinking about how medicine is experienced and practiced and how illness and wellness derive meaning from cultural contexts. Reflecting on my studies in college so far and on my path to medicine going forward, I decided I wanted to spend more time learning through the lens of medical anthropology.

When I returned to UT for the spring 2020 semester, I picked up an anthropology minor and took a particularly influential seminar on The Body in Pain. I also reconnected with the Polymathic Panel, Natural Sciences Council, and my lab group in the Waggoner Center for Alcohol and Addiction Research after a semester away. I was slowly settling back into campus life, but by mid-March, COVID-19 meant that being present in learning and extracurricular spaces suddenly looked very different.

As the pandemic continues, life and work still look different than I had anticipated, but I’m learning to engage in new ways and in new spaces. In May, I joined NSC’s executive board for the 2020-2021 cycle. I am serving as the chair of our Catalyst committee, which oversees NSC’s student publication. This summer, I’m taking a course in cultural anthropology, hoping to build a foundation in the discipline. I’m also interning with the Smithsonian’s Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. As an editorial intern, I get to hear from anthropologists, folklorists, and community leaders as I learn to uplift voices and stories. I’m being challenged to grow as a storyteller and a writer, and I am learning to listen in ways that I haven’t always been able to do from a classroom.

I want to thank the Dedman family for supporting me as I explore new places and move into new fields. The Dedman Scholars program and community have inspired me to bet on myself and find intention and meaning in my experiences. I will always be grateful for the generosity, kindness, and guidance this program has shown me.