Fifty-six Penn State Berks students received recognition at the University Scholastic Awards Ceremony on April 5, in the Multipurpose Room of the Perkins Student Center. The awards presented included the Evan Pugh Scholars Award, the President Sparks Award, and the President’s Freshman Award.
The Evan Pugh Scholars Award is presented to those juniors and seniors who are in the upper 0.5 percent of their respective classes and have completed at least 48 graded Penn State credits at the end of the fall semester of the academic year the award is given. Candidates are eligible if they have been full-time undergraduate students for at least four semesters prior to selection. The juniors and seniors this year have cumulative GPAs of 3.98 and above. Students receiving this award included juniors Bridget M. Baksa, Jason Jiang, Jennifer Maxwell and Sara A. Stoyer; and seniors Stephen Joshua Kina, Manpreet S. Kooner, Steven Mack and Natalie Reigner.
The President Sparks Award is presented annually to those undergraduate degree candidates who have earned a 4.00 (A) cumulative GPA based on at least 36 graded Penn State credits completed by the end of the fall semester of the academic year the award is given. Candidates are eligible for this award if they have not exceeded 59 total credits. This year, Hunter M. Beane, Amanda L. Hauser, Yue Li, Stephen N. Luksic, Lucrezia Pulcini, Karina R. Raykova and Lauren Rickards received this award.
The President’s Freshman Award is presented annually to undergraduate degree candidates and provisional students who have earned a 4.00 (A) cumulative GPA based on at least 12 graded Penn State credits completed by the end of the fall semester of the academic year the award is given. Candidates are eligible for this award if they have not exceeded 35 total credits earned. Students receiving this award included Kristin J. Beiler, Brooke A. Chiappetta, Jing Du, Brooke L. Eveland, Abigail G. Files, Spencer J. Forgette, Zihao Ge, Elizabeth A. Good, Jordan M. Groff, Ibrahim Hajdar, Nathan A. Hess, Ashlea Huber, Emily E. Karas, Alexa T. Kolb, Sarah E. Leisey, Marshall M. Lonigan, Yiwen Lu, Peirong Ma, Jennifer E. Martin, Sarah R. McMullen, Brianna M. Mora, Tahj Sebastian Morales, Tyler M. Mueller, Mark C. Neidert, Lisa N. Panczner, Dixuan Rui, Abhinav Sharma, Lihui Shen, Michael C. Showalter, Xunyuan Sun, Tristan J. Szymborski-Pratt, Veronica M. Ugarelli, Taylor A. Urban, Jiaying Wang, Layne A. Weber, Odesha Williams, Sung Jun Won, Manting Xiong, Yalikun Yaxiaer, Kelsey P. Yochum, Hejin Zhang and Yiwen Zhang.