Contact: Landon Gibson

STARKVILLE, Miss.—Four current Mississippi State students are the newest recipients of outstanding achievement awards from the university’s Association of Retired Faculty.

Founded in 1986, the association presents awards that serve as tributes or memorials to colleagues and association members who made major contributions to student development during their careers at the 142-year-old land-grant institution.

Chosen by MSU faculty members in their respective academic disciplines, recipients each receive a $500 award.

Honorees include:

—Kassidy Adams of Jackson, Missouri, a senior chemical engineering major receiving the Harry Simrall Award for Excellence in Engineering. As a member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, Adams has served as sister chapter liaison, co-president and secretary. She also served as president of Girls Engineering Change. Adams has been the recipient of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Freshman Recognition Award; Donald F. Othmer Sophomore Academic Excellence Award; Donald and Mildred Othmer Scholarship Award; and the Dave and Beth Swalm Chemical Engineering Scholarship Award. Adams is a former co-op student who fulfilled four co-op rotations at Chemours, an American chemical company with a facility in Pass Christian. Most students are only offered three rotations at the company, but due to her outstanding performance, she was invited to return for a fourth.

—Reagan Poston of Eupora, a senior English major receiving the Peyton Ward Williams Jr. Distinguished Writing Award. A Gwin Scholarship recipient, she has won prizes for both fiction and poetry in the 2019 MSU Writing Contest and for poetry at the 2019 Southern Literary Festival, along with being a two-year winner of the MSU English department’s Eugene Butler Scholarship for creative writing. In addition to her writing as a student worker for MSU’s Agriculture and Natural Resources Marketing Team, Poston has written for publications within the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the College of Forest Resources. Her work also has appeared in MAFES Discovers, CALS Influence Alumni magazine, the Forest and Wildlife Research Center Annual Report and articles published by MSU’s Office of Public Affairs.

—Nada Abdel-Aziz of Greenwood, a senior architecture major receiving the William L. Giles Award for Excellence in Architecture. A student in MSU’s Master of Landscape Architecture program, she is a Presidential Scholar, as well as a member of Tau Sigma Delta Architecture honor society. In addition to receiving the $20,000 Aydelott Travel Award for 2019-20, Abdel-Aziz received the American Institute of Architecture Students award at this year’s School of Architecture Recognition Day. Abdel-Aziz also was awarded a 2020 Line Scale Form Design Award for her studio project, “Architecture for Climate Change.”

—Mary Elaine Bridges of Henderson, North Carolina, a senior food science, nutrition and health promotion major receiving the Charles E. Lindley Leadership in Agriculture Award. A student worker in the Office of Nutrition Education, Bridges also has been a President’s and Dean’s Scholar. Within her Kappa Delta sorority, she has served on the food committee, worked in alumnae relations and been a hometown recruitment chair as well as a Panhellenic and Emerging Greeks representative. She also served as president for the Student Dietetic Association along with being a scholarship chair and a member of the National Nutrition Month and Food Service committees. Bridges served as president, secretary and ambassador for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and was a member of the MSU Student Association’s Freshman EDGE program.

For more on MSU’s Association of Retired Faculty, visit http://lib.msstate.edu/arf.

MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.