College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Irvin D. Reid Honors College

Environmental sciences major Jonathan Teh was named a Udall Scholar for the second consecutive year. Teh was one of just 65 students nationwide selected for the honor, which recognizes future leaders in environmental, Tribal public policy and health care fields.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Kate Vaughn, a second-year graduate student studying linguistics, was named a recipient of the prestigious Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals.

James and Patricia Anderson College of Engineering

Engineering student Ishana Iftekhar is part of a meaningful collaboration with the Detroit Public Schools Community District, where she provides academic support to elementary students with special accommodations. Her internship highlights the impact of partnerships between Wayne State and our local communities by expanding access to learning opportunities for students in Detroit. Ishana’s work reflects a strong commitment to community engagement and the tangible difference it can make.

School of Medicine

Samantha Ely, a fourth-year doctoral student in the Translational Neuroscience Program, was awarded a competitive fellowship from the National Institute of Mental Health, part of the National Institutes of Health. The award supports Ely’s research on how brain chemistry and stress response impact emotion regulation in adolescents experiencing suicidal ideation.

School of Medicine

Li Tao, Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Physiology, was named a recipient of the 2026 Next Gen Leadership Award by Advances in Genome Biology and Technology (AGBT). Presented at the AGBT General Meeting in Orlando, the award recognizes outstanding early-career researchers whose innovation and potential are advancing genomics. Li’s research investigates how environmental exposures, including heavy metals, influence liver disease and fibrosis — addressing critical challenges in human health and environmental genomics.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Abdullah Aljanabi, who is majoring in political science with a minor in law, is among 168 students nationwide recognized by ALL IN for advancing nonpartisan civic engagement in 2025. He is one of four students selected from Michigan.

School of Medicine

Elizabeth Beaubien, medical student, has been named the 2026 American College of Emergency Physicians and Emergency Medicine Residents’ Association National Outstanding Medical Student.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

April Sweet Tapayan, Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Chemistry, has been honored with the prestigious 2026 ACS Women Chemists Committee Merck Research Award, highlighting her outstanding contributions to the field of chemistry and chemical biology. She is among only eight exceptional early-career women chemists honored.

Mike Ilitch School of Business

Student Daniel Grey, who is graduating in May 2026 with a master of science in finance, received the Financial Executives International Academic Award from Financial Executives International.

Mike Ilitch School of Business
Irvin D. Reid Honors College

Accounting, finance and honors major Jasraj Singh received the Financial Executives International Academic Award from Financial Executives International.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Irvin D. Reid Honors College
School of Medicine

For his research in brain networks and schizophrenia, Med-Direct student Dhruval Bhatt has won the 2025 Dr. Francis Wayne Quan Memorial Prize from the Mach-Gaensslen Foundation of Canada and the Journal of Psychiatry and Neuroscience.

School of Medicine

Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield has appointed Mohammad Muntakim, M.B.A., a first-year medical student, to provide guidance and recommendations as a member of her transition team. Muntakim serves on Sheffield’s Health, Human Services, Homelessness and Poverty Solutions Committee.

Mike Ilitch School of Business

Athletics

Kayla Giroux has twice received College Sports Communicators (CSC) Academic All-American honors. Giroux was also one of eight student-athletes in the country to be named to the First Team (Second Team in 2024) and 21 players when including all three teams. Giroux carried a 3.99 cumulative GPA in global supply chain management and graduated in 3.5 years.

Center for Excellence and Equity in Mathematics

The Math Corps will receive the 2026 Mathematics Programs that Make a Difference award. Founded in 1991, the Math Corps program, which combines mathematics enrichment and mentoring, was initially created for Detroit public schools and has now expanded to several cities.

Irvin D. Reid Honors College

Mike Ilitch School of Business

Athletics

Track and field thrower Makayla Stewart will graduate this spring in just three years with a bachelor's in global supply chain management and finance, then join General Motors full-time in July. One of her proudest accomplishments — being a team member of Wayne State’s first-ever first-place finish at the Institute for Supply Management 2025 Global Case Competition.

College of Fine, Performing and Communication Arts

At the November 2025 National Communication Association convention, Md Azad, communication graduate teaching assistant, presented the following paper as a principal author, "The Impact of social media messages in the public sphere against the authoritarian regime: A case study on the Tahrir Square movement in Egypt in 2011."

Athletics

The Wayne State volleyball team capped a breakthrough season by winning their first-ever Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Tournament championship.

Mike Ilitch School of Business

Athletics

Kayla Giroux, a senior in global supply chain management and business management, and a volleyball senior middle blocker, has been inducted into the inaugural class of Chi Alpha Sigma, the national athlete honor society.

College of Engineering

First-year student Mikhala Rivers, who is majoring in biomedical engineering major and a member of the fencing team, was just crowned Teen Universe USA. She will be representing the country next year as she competes for the international crown in Nicaragua.

Irvin D. Reid Honors College

Environmental Science major Jonathan Teh has been selected for the prestigious Udall Scholarship in the environmental category, making him Wayne State’s first student selected for the national scholarship, Chosen from 381 nominees from 175 institutions, Teh is one of 55 scholars selected for his outstanding work as an honors student and significant involvement with sustainability research and action on campus and throughout metro Detroit.

College of Education

Madeleine Reardon, a doctoral student in the counseling psychology program, has been awarded a Thomas C. Rumble Fellowship to complete her research on community-based mental health recovery programs. Reardon's research focuses on the Clubhouse model of psychosocial rehabilitation, an evidence-based approach that emphasizes peer collaboration, voluntary participation and community-driven recovery support for individuals living with serious mental illness. Her dissertation aims to identify the critical "tipping points" that facilitate meaningful engagement in recovery programs.

College of Education

Antwuan Williams, B.A. ’08, M.Ed. ’18, a student earning his doctorate in educational studies with a concentration in curriculum and critical social inquiry, received a Thomas C. Rumble Fellowship to focus on his dissertation research on the experiences of Black male math teachers in Detroit’s schools.

"Research shows that when students have teachers who share their racial background, they feel more connected to school, perform better academically, have higher expectations placed on them, and are less likely to be suspended or placed in special education," Williams said. "For Black boys especially, seeing successful Black men in leadership roles like teaching can boost their confidence and help them believe they, too, can succeed. This provides a foundation and the motivation for increasing their social and economic mobility."

Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

Nouran Yonis, a Ph.D. candidate and graduate research assistant in Pharmaceutical Sciences, received the 2025 Inclusive Excellence Scholarship (Dean’s Endowed Recruitment Scholarship) from the Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. The award recognizes academic merit, as well as a commitment to community, inclusion, and leadership. Nouran is the founding president of the University Graduate Student Association, created to help other graduate students build and find community on campus. She is committed to this work by creating spaces where everyone feels heard, valued, and empowered to succeed, while continuing to serve as a role model for others, particularly women, navigating their academic journeys.

College of Nursing

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP), Family Nurse Practitioner student Shayanna Stryd is gaining national recognition for her impactful work aimed at improving mental health care in underserved communities. Her scholarly project was accepted for publication in the Journal of Christian Nursing, and she was offered a fellowship in the organization.

School of Medicine

Aunna Pourang, M.D., a Dermatology resident, has won the 2024-25 Peter Svider Memorial Resident Scholarship Award. The award is presented annually to a graduating resident or fellow in a graduate medical education program in recognition of distinctive achievement in research activities across the period of residency training. The Svider Award recognizes a resident who has achieved a high level of scholarly productivity reflecting the ideals of graduate medical training.

College of Education

Shea Tripp, a senior on the women's basketball team majoring in health and physical education, was nationally recognized for her successful performances on the court and in the classroom and for her continued commitment to the community. Tripp has recorded more than 480 hours of community service as a Warrior and was awarded the prestigious John Wooden Citizenship Cup.

School of Medicine

Elizabeth Helfrich, a third-year medical student, has been selected to serve as a Medical Student Ambassador for the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine’s 2025 Annual Meeting.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

School of Medicine

M.D./Ph.D. student Andrea Batchev, who is a research assistant in the Department of chemistry, has earned the NIH F30 award. The award, also known as the Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award, supports the integrated research and clinical training of students pursuing a career as physician-scientists. Batchev’s research explores outersphere kinetic control over the oxidation of oxygen-sensitive MRI contrast agents for imaging hypoxia.

Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

School of Medicine

Taylor Takla, a Ph.D. candidate in translational neuroscience program, received a two-year, 96,812ドル F31 grant from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health to study fear of falling in those with multiple sclerosis.

College of Nursing

Jonas Nursing, a leading supporter of doctoral nursing education in the U.S., and the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, announced that Ph.D. student Biyyiah Lee has been selected as a Jonas Scholar for the program’s 2024-2026 cohort. The program aims to improve health care by expanding the pool of Ph.D. and DNP-prepared nurses needed to educate the next generation of nurse leaders.

School of Medicine

Doctoral candidate Mizumi Setia's research shined bright at the annual meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology Conference, the world’s largest eye and vision research organization. Setia won the Cora Verhagen Young Investigator Award in Ocular Immunology, given to the best poster or paper presented by a graduate student or postdoctoral fellow in the immunology session. She also was named the runner up for the organization’s Raniyah Ramadan Young Investigator Award in Microbiology.

School of Medicine

The Arnold P. Gold Foundation has named Peter Dimitrion a 2024 Gold Student Summer Fellow. The Gold Foundation offers fellowships annually to provide opportunities for medical students to deepen their understanding of health inequities, to advance culturally responsive care and to direct attention toward community health needs.

College of Engineering

Anahita Zahertar, a distinguished Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Wayne State University, was awarded first place in the student poster competition at the Great Lakes District meeting of the Institute of Transportation Engineers. Zahertar's research focuses on the integration of bikeshare and transit systems in Detroit, a pivotal step toward equitable transportation solutions for the city.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

As a student employee with Learning Support Services, Taybah presented at a supplemental instruction (SI) conference in Baltimore. She has been recognized by the team for her dedication to student success and academic achievements.

‘...Taybah holds a passion for learning and helping individuals succeed, no matter their background or major. She has been an incredible role model for the Learning Support Services peer leaders and has created an impact in the entire department."

-University Counselor Shaina Jansen

College of Engineering

Nuha was awarded the Michigan Council of Women in Technology scholarship. The award has inspired her to continue pursuing her passion for technology and computer science and to take advantage of the networking opportunities to connect with other women in the field.

Irvin D. Reid Honors College

Carissa was named one of the 2023 American Council on Education’s Students of the Year. Bennett is a Marine Corps veteran and an aspiring pediatric neurologist, who has excelled in the classroom and in supporting the community through organizations dedicated to helping veterans, children and people with neurological disabilities.

Mike Ilitch School of Business

Nina presented her research about marketing customer loyalty programs at the National Convention of Undergraduate Research.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Biola Makinde-Odusola is the first student to complete the Dean of Students Office's Warrior Rewards path, designed to help students develop life-long friendships and connect with Wayne State. Makinde-Odusola participated in 68 events and experiences.

Student-Athlete, Tennis

Daniel Grey was named Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Men's Tennis Player of the Week for the fourth time this season.

School of Medicine

Abigail and her faculty mentor, Associate Professor Kristen Purrington, have secured Wayne State's first spot in the prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Institute fellowship program. The pair's work investigating racial disparities in breast cancer survival rate aligns with the program's commitment to building a more inclusive scientific ecosystem.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Biological sciences Ph.D. student Katrina Lewandowski is a 2024 John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellow, working as a coastal resilience specialist in the National Sea Grant office. She is currently working on her dissertation in Great Lakes ecology.