South Dakota State University

Engineering students at South Dakota State University pedaled their way to a third-place finish in the national e-Human Powered Vehicle Challenge at Liberty University, Forest, Virginia. The contest is sponsored by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and attracted 15 teams. The University of Central Florida won with 51.23 points while Missouri University of Science and Technology was second with 46.49 points. SDSU's 44.54 points edged the University of Wisconsin-Madison (44.50). Scoring is in two parts-design and endurance racing. SDSU finished first in design and ninth in racing.

For the second year in a row and the fourth time in school history, the best student chapter nationwide of the American Society of Civil Engineers belongs to South Dakota State University. "I was so ecstatic to hear that we had won again and a little bit surprised," said Rachel Zook, the 2022 president of the chapter and its 2021 vice president. Chapter adviser Zach Gutzmer, a lecturer in the civil engineering department at SDSU, made the announcement to the chapter's officer team April 17, but the formal presentation of the Ridgway Award won't be until this fall.

South Dakota State University's forensics team placed fourth in the Tier 2 Individual Events Team Sweepstakes and fifth in the Tier 2 Combined Debate and Individual Events Team Sweepstakes at the 2023 Pi Kappa Delta National Comprehensive Tournament in March at West Chester University in Pennsylvania.

From Galileo to Isaac Newton to Albert Einstein, physics has been dominated by people who were set apart from their contemporaries. For South Dakota State University physics majors Gavin Baker and Jax Wysong, it is undergraduate research that has set them apart from their contemporaries. In March, they shared their undergraduate research with those gathered at the mass meeting of the American Physical Society in Las Vegas. It is an international gathering with more than 10,000 participants. Their research on Heusler alloys was undertaken at the direction of associate professor Parashu Kharel, who has National Science Foundation funding for the work.

SDSU doctoral student Andrew Simpson has been chosen as one of 22 students to present his poster at the Joint Statistical Meeting of the American Statistical Association in Toronto Aug. 5-10. It is the largest gathering of statisticians and data scientists in North America with nearly 7,000 attendees, including 1,000 students. His adviser, Semhar Michael, an associate professor of statistics at SDSU, said, "The student paper competition is a big part of this conference and, to my knowledge, this is the first time an SDSU student has been selected."

South Dakota State University pharmacy student Madisen "Maddi" Hansen, of Watertown, has received a prestigious national scholarship through the Kappa Epsilon pharmacy fraternity. Hansen is one of five recipients of the $1,000 Zada M. Cooper Scholarship for 2023. She is the 22nd SDSU pharmacy student to receive the award in its 63-year history, two in the first 31 years and 20 in the last 36 years. Hansen is the first SDSU recipient since Abigail Sirek in 2020.

Men's hockey is back at South Dakota State University for the first time in four years, with students taking to the ice at Larson Ice Center for the past few months as an official club sport.

More often than not, the story about how someone figured out what they want to do-with their life or their career-is quite interesting. When a person is passionate about what they do, the "how I got to where I am" can even be inspiring.

The following students graduated after the summer and fall 2022 semesters at South Dakota State University. Nearly 1,000 students completed all requirements for a degree and/or certificate program, and those requirements have been verified by the appropriate college. Overall, students from 35 states and 28 nations graduated following the summer and fall 2022 semesters. Twenty students received two or more degrees or certificates from a college.

The sports and recreation management program is relatively young, compared to other programs at SDSU, but has seen exponential growth in recent years. The undergraduate program has grown by 86% while the graduate program has grown by 367%.

Ellie Balken, a South Dakota State University pharmacy student, has received a couple major recognitions from the nation's largest and oldest association of pharmacists in the United States. Balken, of Dilworth, Minnesota, was one of four students to receive the Student Leadership Award from the American Pharmacists Association-Academy of Student Pharmacists and one of six students chosen for its National Standing Committee. In addition, she and another SDSU student will give a presentation at the association's annual meeting in Phoenix March 24-27.

What goes up must come down. That is the interesting dilemma for a group of South Dakota State University engineering students whose project has been selected as one of six finalists in a NASA competition. The six senior mechanical engineering majors entered NASA's FLOATing DRAGON Challenge. That's NASA's simplified title for the Formulate, Lift, Observe, And Testing; Data Recovery And Guided On-board Node (FLOATing DRAGON) Balloon Challenge.

A cohort of six South Dakota State University Indigenous undergraduate students honored "place" through a series of performances at the National Communication Association Annual Conference. The theme for the national conference, held Nov. 17-20 in New Orleans, was "Honoring PLACE: People, Liberation, Advocacy, Community and Environment."

The robotics club at South Dakota State University is better equipped to enter a collegiate combat robotics contest this spring after receiving a $10,000 grant. The SDSU Robotics Club received notice Jan. 27 that it was among 100 college robotics organizations receiving a $10,000 award from the Norwalk Havoc Robot League in Norwalk, Connecticut. The grants are designed "to help inspire innovation and provide robotics teams with resources they need to reach their full potential," the league stated on its website.

Walgreens, one of America's largest retail drugstore chains, renewed its support of student success and inclusion within the South Dakota State University College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Professions through a $5,000 donation presented Feb. 1 to Dean Dan Hansen. The presentation was made by Jason Frederick, district manager with Walgreens in Sioux Falls, and Curt Orchard, health care supervisor for Walgreens' Minnesota South region in Roseville. The donation funds two $2,5000 scholarships. The 2022-23 recipients of these awards are: Hyunjun Cho, of Bakersfield, California, who is in her first year of pharmacy school; and Amy Cockrum, of Sioux Falls, who is in her third year of pharmacy school. Hansen said, "For many years, Walgreens has shown a strong commitment to supporting South Dakota State University and our historic land-grant mission of access. These scholarships support our efforts to expand opportunities for all students in our profession."

South Dakota State University senior Jay Holm wants state legislators to know about an encroaching tree species that is threatening native grassland bird populations. Holm, a Dell Rapids native studying wildlife and fisheries sciences, is among two SDSU undergraduates who will showcase their research in front of South Dakota lawmakers early next month. He and Madison Fitch will travel to Pierre on Feb. 7 for the 2023 South Dakota Student Research Poster Session. Student researchers from Black Hills State University, University of South Dakota, Dakota State University, South Dakota Mines and Northern State University will also present their work. Jay Holm, a senior majoring in wildlife and fisheries sciences, with his research poster. Encroaching on grasslands For the last year or so, Holm has been investigating the spread of the eastern redcedar, a woody juniper tree species, in the Northern Great Plains. Due to fire suppression, planting in windbreaks and overgrazing, the ERC has been encroaching on native grasslands in the region. "If you drive around the countryside in South Dakota and look at the fields, you might see a bunch of scattered little pine trees," Holm said. "Those are probably eastern redcedars." While the ERC isn't necessarily an invasive species, the wildlife biology community is concerned that the spread of ERC could have a destructive impact on grassland bird populations, which include species like sedge wren, bobolink, western meadowlark, grasshopper sparrow and Savannah sparrow. Because of its widespread use among farmers in shelter belts, the ERC, often found in woodland areas, has been extending outside of its native range. ERCs are now sprouting-and growing-in grassland areas. ERCs, along with invasive species, are contributing to the decline of native grasslands around the world. Other threats to grassland destruction include overgrazing, crop clearing and unsustainable agricultural practices. Since the '80s, grasslands have declined by 50%, Holm said. "The decline of many of the native grassland bird species have declined alongside the grasslands," Holm said. "With this study, I wanted to compare grassland that has been encroached by the ERC and grassland that hasn't and see if there's any difference in the bird communities between the two." What Holm found, at first, was surprising. He was expecting to see a decline in species population's diversity metrics, distribution and richness. What he found instead was those metrics had actually increased. "This was confusing-did this mean the encroachment was actually a good thing for the bird populations?" Holm said. "We then looked at some literature and found that this was pretty much expected." What was happening in the areas that Holm studied (public land in the surrounding Brookings area) is what he calls a "temporary ecotone effect," which is a transitional area between two distinct habitats, grasslands and woodlands. The native grassland bird species are able to persist in this transitional period when the trees are not fully grown, alongside woodland species that are moving into this new habitat. In other areas of the country where the ERC has encroached, like Kansas, the trees are much taller and have pushed out many of the grassland birds. Previous research has suggested that with a 25% canopy cover, grassland birds are no longer able to persist in their native, encroached habitat, Holm explained. "I did some GIS imagery to see what our canopy cover was at for my study sites," Holm said. "We are only at about 9%, so there is a ways to go." Solutions Considering the 9% canopy cover, there is still time to reverse the trend, Holm said. While a singular solution has yet to be fully developed, there are a number in the works. One of the more interesting solutions is the use of goats. "What they do is they'll eat the bark off the ERC trees, which effectively kills them," Holm said. "A grad student here at SDSU is investigating to see if this is a feasible control method." The "mechanical" method is by using a bulldozer to basically "chop them down," Holm said. The other, most proven method is the use of prescribed burns, which would do an adequate job of eliminating many of these trees in their early stages (and would allow for native plants to grow and flourish), but as Holm explains, private landowners have become wary of allowing agencies to carry out these types of burns. "The prevailing thought is that they started to become afraid of (burns) because of the Smokey the Bear campaign to prevent forest fires back in the '80s," Holm said. "There's a lot of extension going on right now to try and educate them about burns and how safe and beneficial they are." Without any interventions, grasslands will continue to decline which will then lead to the decline of native grassland species-which are essential to a healthy, balanced ecosystem, Holm said. Further, as habitats merge, species tend to evolve into more generalists, rather than specialists. "When this happens, you basically see a drop in biodiversity," Holm said. "Biodiversity makes an ecosystem more resilient to environmental change, essentially, because you have more species with different adaptions." As Holm notes, this is one of the chief reasons why biologists harp on "preserving biodiversity" and why individual ecosystems, like grasslands, must be preserved. Future plans Holm will graduate this spring and then is hoping to move on to grad school, where he will pursue a master's degree in environmental education. He's also considering a more research-focused grad school option in which he will continue with similar studies. "I'm very interested in public outreach and educating people," Holm said. As for his post academic career, Holm isn't 100% sure what he wants to do, but he is interested in outreach, education and teaching. "I wouldn't mind being a wildlife education program coordinator, and I wouldn't mind being a professor either," Holm said. "K-12 education would be good to as would being a wildlife biologist for a state agency. I'm leaving my options open."

Madison Fitch, a senior at South Dakota State University, will show state legislators the need for palliative care services for Native Americans in rural communities when she heads to the Capitol next month. Fitch, a Rapid City native majoring in nursing, is one of two SDSU undergraduates who will showcase their research in front of South Dakota lawmakers. Fitch and Jay Holm will travel to Pierre on Feb. 7 for the 2023 South Dakota Student Research Poster Session.

Lesly Abarca-Valladares, a senior advertising major in the School of Communication and Journalism at South Dakota State University, has been named one of the nation's most promising multicultural students for 2023 by the American Advertising Federation. Industry leaders have selected 50 of the highest-achieving diverse seniors in the U.S. to participate this spring in AAF's premier industry immersion program in New York City promoting diversity, equality and inclusion.

Nick Grote became only the second South Dakota State University student selected to participate in an elite group that toured Israel during Christmas break. Grote, a 2021 graduate of Aberdeen Central High School and a junior business economics major, was one of 70 U.S. college students chosen for the Jewish National Fund's Caravan for Democracy. The all-expense paid, 10-day (Dec. 27-Jan. 7) trip was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, Grote said.

More than 3,200 students were recognized for their outstanding academic performance over the fall 2022 semester at South Dakota State University by being named to the dean's list. To earn dean's list distinctions in SDSU's colleges, students must have completed a minimum of 12 credits and must have earned at least a 3.5 GPA on a 4.0 scale. Students with F, I, U, RI or RU grades are not eligible regardless of system term GPA attained. Note that this report includes courses that were taken at other South Dakota institutions this term. A minimum of 12 credits within the 100-699 course range must be taken. A student who passes pregeneral education courses may still qualify, if the student has 12 other credits that do fall within the 100-699 range. Overall, 3,230 students from 34 states and 20 foreign nations are on the list. Nearly 1,400 students received a 4.0 and those are indicated with an asterisk. Congratulations to these distinguished scholars on earning this academic achievement.

Judges from NASA and other experts have selected a proposal from a group of South Dakota State University engineering students to compete with 14 other teams in the next stage of the $3.5 million Break the Ice Lunar Challenge. Most of the SDSU students are seniors entering their final semester.

The South Dakota State University Concert Choir will embark on its fall tour, "All Creation Sings," with 11 total performances starting Sunday in Sioux Falls and culminating at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 4 with a home concert at the Oscar Larson Performing Arts Center. The choir, under the direction of Laura Diddle, will perform music that celebrates creation in all forms at venues across South Dakota and Iowa over the next week. The choir's first three performances are in Sioux Falls, starting with a 7:30 p.m. Sunday concert at St. Joseph Cathedral in Sioux Falls. "The Concert Choir is honored to have been invited to sing on the St. Joseph Cathedral Sacred Arts Series," said Diddle, the Paul E. and Doris J. Moriarty Endowed Professor of Choral Activities. To celebrate that space, the concert opens with a contemporary piece, "Hodie!" with pipe organ and accompanied by organist/pianist Angela Hertling. Other pieces include "A Soft Day," "Flower of Beauty," "The Lark in the Clear Air" featuring SDSU assistant professor Elizabeth Robinson on flute, "Shenandoah," "Unclouded Day," Giancarlo Aquilanti's "Ave Maria" and contemporary composer Elizabeth Siegel's "To Be Free." Monday starts with a morning performance at Lincoln High School and an afternoon performance at O'Gorman High School. Then the choir heads to Iowa for a 7:30 p.m. Monday concert at Cathedral of the Epiphany in Sioux City. On Tuesday, the choir has morning performances at Sioux City's East High School and Maple Valley-Anthon Oto School in Mapleton, Iowa, followed by 7:30 p.m. concert at St. Bernard Catholic Church in Osceola, Iowa. Wednesday brings the choir to a morning performance at Clarke Community Schools in Osceola, Iowa, and an afternoon performance at Yankton High School. The singers' day ends with a 7 p.m. concert at Friedens Reformed Church in Tripp. Finally, the choir is back in Brookings for a concert at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 4 at the Larson Memorial Concert Hall on the SDSU campus. No admission will be charged at any concert. "The Concert Choir takes a fall tour every year and looks forward to performing in major metropolitan areas and in small towns in the Midwest," Diddle said. "The singers in the choir come from South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska and Wisconsin, and all have been singing since they were quite young. They look forward to representing SDSU across the North Central region." The 70-member Concert Choir serves as the ambassadorial choral ensemble of the Music Department at SDSU. Comprised of SDSU's most gifted and talented vocalists, membership in the choir is contingent upon excellence in musicianship, vocal artistry and dedication.

Two SDSU Wildlife and Fisheries master's students have won the John E. Skinner Memorial Fund award, presented by the American Fisheries Society (AFS). The award, presented at the AFS annual meeting which took place from Aug. 21-25 in Spokane, Washington, with 1,600 attendees, provides monetary travel awards for graduate students to attend. Administered by the AFS Education Section, students active in fisheries or related disciplines are invited to apply. Each year 10 students are selected to win.

Three students from South Dakota State University have been awarded the American Public Health Association's (APHA) Student Champions for Climate Justice Award. The team proposed an academic community experience that "shows how climate change affects health equality." "It is inspiring to see the passion these students have to not only raise awareness about climate justice issues but to move action forward among their academic communities" said Evelyn Maldonado, the APHA center's program associate. SDSU's team includes Madison DeJarlais, a geographic information sciences major; Jaimie Roggenbauer, a student in the Master of Public Health (MPH) program; and Peggy Harper, also an MPH student and an instructor in the geography and geospatial sciences department. Their proposed experience addresses food access and food deserts in South Dakota. Through the project, the team will develop an informational map showing how climate change impacts access to food in South Dakota, along with other educational resources including two podcasts and a trivia game. For Harper, Roggenbauer and Dejarlais, climate change's impact on food access in South Dakota is an important issue. Harper said, "Climate change is global in scale and many don't understand how this global phenomenon can impact our everyday lives. Public health, especially regarding the availability of healthy food, brings climate change to a very personal level." Roggenbauer is a native of South Dakota who enjoys rock climbing in the Black Hills. She said she "can see how climate change has impacted the natural landscape, and especially on our reservation lands." Those living on reservations are one of the populations most impacted by limited food access in the state. "The issues we are discussing here disproportionately affect the Native American community in South Dakota," DeJarlais said. In the rural state of South Dakota, food access has been an issue for many populations and the effects of climate change have exacerbated the need for a solution. According to DeJarlais, the United States is facing a number of public health crises, including "food deserts." A food desert, DeJarlais said, is a "geographic area where there is limited reasonable access to affordable healthy foods." The goal of the project is to create awareness and resources to improve food access in the state. One of the resources to be developed is the creation of maps of food resources. Harper said, "We will map locations of food banks, local farmers' markets, community gardens, urban foraging (if available) and other places that can provide food to local community residents. The maps will also pinpoint areas that are lacking in these food outlets: the food deserts." Harper said the next step is to "create a plan to build our climate justice experience." Their team is working on contacting South Dakota Indigenous leaders and experts in climate change and public health for their input in the development of resources, including the maps and podcasts. "It would be amazing if our work could be utilized by the public to help petition for actual change, like lobbying for community gardens, food drives, food fridges and/or mobile markets," said DeJarlais. She added that there are ways to address the problem of food deserts that do not involve opening a grocery store, which can sometimes harm communities through gentrification. One strategy to increase awareness of the impact of climate change on food access in the state is through the development of two podcasts. For the first podcast, the team is partnering with South Dakota Urban Indian Health to provide educational information on how climate change has impacted and is impacting Indigenous populations. The other is a podcast presentation from SDSU's Master of Public Health core program "Public Health and Native American Communities" that will educate listeners on climate change and how it impacts public health issues in South Dakota. According to Harper, the goal of these podcasts is to "highlight the impact on at-risk populations: Indigenous people and residents living in rural areas of South Dakota. These groups are already at risk for many current public health issues including access to healthy foods." DeJarlais said that the podcasts will "give a voice to those who have been systematically underrepresented and unheard in both the social and political sphere." The team has begun work on the development of these resources and hopes to make them available over the next few months. Through projects like this, public health students and professionals, like Harper, DeJarlais and Roggenbauer, are working hard to combat public health issues created or exacerbated by climate change. The student team will receive $500 to support their proposed experience. Other student team winners hail from Georgetown University, University of Florida, Loyola University Chicago and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. "Hint to help your score in the trivia game-some of the answers will be provided within the story map and the podcasts," Harper added. South Dakota State University offers an online Master of Public Health program in collaboration with the University of South Dakota. The program and its expert faculty are committed to supporting local, state, federal and tribal health departments and to graduate students who will go on to improve the state of public health in South Dakota and beyond. To learn more about the program, visit: https://www.sdstate.edu/pharmacy-allied-health-professions/master-public-health.

The South Dakota State University 1/4 Scale Tractor Team was recently named champions of the 2022 American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers International 1/4 Scale Tractor Student Design Competition. This year's team competed against 24 teams from across the United States and Canada.

South Dakota State University student Jordan Rusche has been named to the Pulitzer Center's 2022 cohort of 53 Reporting Fellows. The Pulitzer Center awards fellowships to students at its campus consortium partners, which include liberal arts colleges, community colleges, state universities, historically Black colleges and universities, and graduate schools of journalism and public health in the U.S., Canada and Qatar. Each fellow is paired with an adviser-a Pulitzer Center grantee with special expertise in the fellow's topic or reporting destination. Pulitzer Center editors also provide mentoring in reporting, writing and multimedia. Rusche, a senior from Bancroft, will look at Native American education in South Dakota. Her reporting will examine legislative efforts to improve education in tribal communities and also systemic and political barriers faced by tribal nations. Rusche was the editor-in-chief at The Collegian, SDSU's student newspaper, for the 2021-22 academic year and will be the co-editor for the 2022-23 academic year. "This fellowship puts Jordan in elite company and it provides her with an excellent challenge that will make her an even better young reporter," said Jim Helland '86/M.S. '12, an instructor in SDSU's School of Communication and Journalism. "The topic she has chosen related to Native American education is a story that needs to be told. I can't wait to read her final product." "It's a great honor to be able to represent SDSU and South Dakota through my reporting this fall," Rusche said. "I'm excited to meet the other fellows and learn about the great articles they are going to share as well." As a fellow, Rusche will also take part in the center's Washington Weekend in October. Including Rusche, the last five SDSU fellows were: 2021 - Wren Murphy 2019 - Laura Butterbrodt 2017 - Palak Barmaiya 2016 - Makenzie Huber

The following students graduated after the spring 2022 semester at South Dakota State University. The more than 1,500 students listed below completed all requirements for a degree and/or certificate program and those requirements have been verified by the appropriate college. Overall, students from 33 states and 20 nations graduated following the spring 2022 semester. More than 100 students received two or more degrees or certificates from a college.

More than 3,000 students were recognized for their outstanding academic performance over the spring 2022 semester at South Dakota State University by being named to the dean's list. To earn dean's list distinctions in SDSU's colleges, students must have completed a minimum of 12 credits and must have earned at least a 3.5 GPA on a 4.0 scale. Students with F, I, U, RI or RU grades are not eligible regardless of system term GPA attained. Note that this report includes courses that were taken at other South Dakota institutions this term. A minimum of 12 credits within the 100-699 course range must be taken. A student who passes pregeneral education courses may still qualify, if the student has 12 other credits that do fall within the 100-699 range. Overall, more than 3,070 students from 35 states and 22 foreign nations are on the list. Nearly 1,400 students received a 4.0 and those are indicated with an asterisk. Congratulations to these distinguished scholars on earning this academic achievement.

The following people recently were initiated into The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, the nation's oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines.

The following people recently were initiated into The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, the nation's oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines.