Students from the College of Arts & Letters and the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities (RCAH) earned top honors at the 9th Annual Diversity Research Showcase hosted by MSU’s Honors College. Thirteen students from the two colleges presented their research, with two RCAH students receiving first place in the poster presentation category and a College of Arts & Letters student earning third place in the oral presentations category.
The 2026 Diversity Research Showcase, which was open to all MSU undergraduate students, took place on Jan. 23 at Campbell Hall and online. The event gave undergraduate students the opportunity to share their research on diversity issues in a supportive and constructive atmosphere.
This year, about 40 undergraduate students participated across both poster and oral presentation categories, including 11 from the College of Arts & Letters and two from RCAH. Research topics spanned cultural, racial, ethnic, functional, gender, international, LGBTQIA2S+, and political diversity. Thanks to the generous donations from the program sponsors, monetary prizes ranging from $150 to $750 were awarded to the top presenters in each of the oral and poster categories.
In the poster presentations category, students shared their work online and the award winners were recognized at the in-person ceremony in Campbell Hall. Receiving the first-place prize of $750 was the research team of Kellsey Hall, third-year Arts and Humanities major in RCAH, and Alana Mapp, third-year Honors College student with a double major in Arts and Humanities in RCAH and Sociology in the College of Social Science. Their research mentors were Tama Hamilton-Wray, Associate Professor of Africana Film Studies in RCAH, and Sitara Thobani, Associate Professor in RCAH.
Hall and Mapp’s first-place project is titled “RCAH Sister Circle as a Third Space: How Does Sister Circle Impact the Sense of Belonging in Women and Women of Color at Predominately White Institutions Like MSU?” Third spaces are places outside of home and work where people come together, feel supported, and build community. For women of color at predominantly white institutions, these spaces become especially important as they offer a sense of comfort, understanding, and belonging. Hall and Mapp’s study looks at how RCAH’s Sister Circle has grown over time and how it continues to support students’ confidence, comfort, and sense of belonging.
In the oral presentation category, students had five minutes to explain their research to an audience, followed by two minutes for questions. There was a tie for third place with one of the third-place prizes of $450 going to Rachel Zhai, second-year Honors College student who is double majoring in Neuroscience in Lyman Briggs College and English in the College of Arts & Letters. Zhai’s project is titled “Asian American Youth Co-Designing Heritage Language Workshops for Immigrant Families: A Community-Based Participatory Research Study.” Jungmin Kwon, Associate Professor of Language and Literacy in the Department of Teacher Education in the College of Education at MSU, was Zhai’s mentor.
Zhai’s study is part of a larger community-based participatory research project where three teacher educators and educational researchers collaborated with four Asian American youth to co-design and co-lead workshops aimed at fostering heritage language learning and maintenance among immigrant children and families in an effort to better understand how these efforts shape cultural identity and community building.
“I’m honored to have received third place in the 2026 Diversity Research Showcase as a sophomore,” Zhai said. “My work investigates the role of Asian American youth serving as heritage language educators in the community with a focus on Korean and Chinese heritage. In the future, I hope this work will contribute to the existing field of research and help to further diversity studies regarding the East Asian diaspora.”
Zhai was the only student from the College of Arts & Letters and Residential College in the Arts and Humanities who participated in the oral presentations category at the Diversity Research Showcase.
For the full list of all the prize winners, see the Diversity Research Showcase article published on the MSU Honors College website.
Other College of Arts & Letters Student Research Projects
The other College of Arts & Letters students who participated in this year’s Diversity Research Showcase and their poster presentation projects include the following:
“Migration from the U.S.A. to Japan: Examining Motivations and Integration of American Migrants” by Josef Bulko, fourth-year Honors College, Global and International Studies (College of Social Science) and Japanese (College of Arts & Letters) double major.
“Art as Medicine: Integrating Virtual Art Exhibitions into a Replicable Model for Creative Therapy” by Brayden Chrisman, third-year Honors College, English with Secondary Education major; Elliott Bishop, second-year Theatre major; and Abigail Brooks, third-year English and Humanities-Prelaw double major.
“Re-Defining Creativity: Expanding Access to Art through Intentional Changes to Curative Rhetoric” by Allison Doneth, fourth-year Honors College, Neuroscience (Lyman Briggs College) and French (College of Arts & Letters) double major; Abigail Brooks, third-year English and Humanities-Prelaw double major; and Lorraine Inman, third-year Honors College, Games and Interactive Media (College of Communication Arts and Sciences) and English (College of Arts & Letters) double major; and Elliott Bishop, second-year Theatre major.
“Complexities of the American “Latino Vote” by Roberto Garcia, third-year Honors College, English (College of Arts & Letters) and Sociology (College of Social Science) double major.
“Examining the Effects of Enculturation on Narratives and Interpretation of Music Excerpts” by Yigit Akan, third-year Honors College, English and Film Studies double major; Madelyn Corgan, first-year Honors College, English and Studio Art double major; and Natalie Seitz, fourth-year Neuroscience (Lyman Briggs College) major.
By Kim Popiolek
