On May 3rd, BSOS Dean's Graduate Student Advisory Council hosted the inangural BSOS Graduate Students Enlightening Talk competition. Four PhD students from the department, Rachel Lamb, Amanda Hoffman-Hall, Daniel Teodoro, and Pan He, participated in the competition together with graduate students from other departments within BSOS.

The competition followed the same format of Three-Minute Thesis Competition initialized by The University of Queensland. Presenters are required to efficiently communicate their research within three minutes to broad audience. The judging panel, including faculty members across different colleges, chose Amanda as the second place for the competition and Rachel sharing the first place with another graduate student from Sociology.

Dr. Wayne McIntosh, Associate Dean for Graduate and Faculty Affairs and member of the judging panel, commented on the performance of all participants, "All presenters have done terrific job on sharing their exciting research with us. It is a really tough decision for us (the judging panel) to choose the winner." Amanda and Rachel both will receive research funds from Dean's Office to conduct their dissertation research.

Congratulations to all four students sucessfully participated in the competition! The titles of their talks are listed below.

Daniel Teodoro: Addressing Climate Change One Social Relationship at a Time

Rachel Lamb: How Planting Trees Makes Us Climate-smart and Economic Savvy

Amanda Hall: Seeing the Devil from the Sky: Mapping Malaria Vulnerability for Myanmar

Pan He: The Double Inequality of Diets: How the Wealth Affects Our Health and Environment