Western Libraries is pleased to announce the winners of the 2018 Western Libraries Undergraduate Research Award

Western Libraries gives three awards are given annually to Western Washington University undergraduate students in recognition of their excellence and originality in creating research papers for courses taught across the colleges based on significant inquiry using library resources and collections.

This year's recipients are: 

• Madelyn Merritt, for "Intention and Action: Facebook Unfriending Habits Following the 2016 Presidential Election." 
• Asia Fields, for "Media Coverage of Transgender People Through Danica Roem’s Election Coverage."
• Matthew Horn, for "Change in the Usage of 老 in Chinese Vernacular Literature."

Each winner of the Western Libraries Undergraduate Research Award receives a certificate, a cash award of $500, and publication of their prize-winning paper in Western CEDAR, Western Washington University’s institutional repository. Winners will also be recognized at a reception hosted by Western Libraries before the end of spring quarter (on a date still to be determined).

Award applicants must demonstrate outstanding library research in the writing of their research papers, and winners are selected by an award review committee consisting of a variety of faculty members from Western Libraries and other disciplines at Western.

Congratulations to all three talented award winners! And a special thank you also goes out to the Award Review Committee (Elizabeth Stephan, Gabe Gossett, Brian J. Bowe, Coleen Laird, Janet Xing) and the students' faculty mentors, (Glenn Tsunokai, Brian J. Bowe, and Janet Xing).