Honors Student Spotlight

Apr. 25, 2012

Mallory Brown is our current Honors student spotlight. Mallory is from Richmond, KY. In high school, she was very involved in her high school's marching band, playing clarinet and participating on the Winter Guard team. She was also a member of the jazz band. Mallory also participated in the Kentucky United Nations Assembly, a mock United Nations conference where students debate global politics and celebrate cultural diversity.

Mallory will be graduating this summer with a degree in Mechanical and Aerospace engineering. She has applied to graduate school at Virginia Tech and hopes to complete a PhD in Aerospace Engineering. Mallory's dream job would be to work with NASA one day. Mallory was recently accepted to present at the 63rd International Astronautical Congress in Naples, Italy. The IAC is a professional conference hosted by the International Astronautical Federation (IAF) with the International Academy of Astronautics and the International Institute of Space Law (IISL), which is attended by many of the leading minds in the aerospace, aviation, and aeronautics communities. The conference accepts abstracts from all disciplines, and UAHuntsville sends students from all majors annually.

During her time at UAH, Mallory has been an active Honors student, participating in small study groups and serving as a student assistant in Sandra Watts' dance courses.

Honors Faculty in the Spotlight

April 4, 2012

Our Honors faculty member in the spotlight is Dr. Christina Carmen. She mentors Honors students through senior design teams in mechanical and aerospace engineering. Since these classes focus on product realization, from inception to actually building a unique and patentable product, Honors students receive an accelerated introduction to writing journal papers and presenting papers at conferences.

She is impressed with the quality of our outstanding Honors students. One of her senior design teams garnered first place in NASA ESMD Systems Engineering competition last year (previous winners were MIT, Ga. Tech, and Va. Tech). She would like to see more students become involved with the Honors Program

She first came to Huntsville after receiving her Master's from Georgia Tech. She was immediately impressed with the personal attention students received at UAHuntsville; she found it very conducive to self-motivated students being able to pursue many opportunites. After completing her PhD here, she joined the faculty of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.

As for the value of the Honors Program, she says: "The Honors Program motivates students to excel and continue to develop their skills and futher their education. Undergraduate research and the opportunities available for such via the UAH Honors Program is truly extraordinary. I once had a student present at a conference and she told me afterward 'I feel as if I can do anything.' This is why I love the program!"

She has loved everything about planes from an early age, and even sold greeting cards so she could buy a telescope to become an astronaut. She's also a big fan of the band U2 ("the greatest band ever!").