UT Co-Op George H. Mitchell Award

Student Awards for Academic Excellence

In Spring 2025 the University of Texas at Austin, with the generous support of the University Co-op, will recognize undergraduate students for superior scholarly or creative achievement. Four recipients will receive awards of $5,000 each and two will receive the top prize of $7,000.

The Mitchell Awards Selection Committee consists of university faculty members who choose the recipients.

News:

Deadline:
March 26, 2025


Eligibility

Applicants must be either a junior or senior currently enrolled at UT or have received their undergraduate degree in December 2024. Submitted work should be finished or close to finished (e.g. a complete draft of a thesis or research paper). Previous Mitchell Awards recipients are eligible only if the submitted work is a completely different project. Both the student application with all its supporting materials and the faculty recommendation form must be received by the deadline for the application to be considered.

The following materials must be uploaded via Interfolio:

  1. The student project (paper, thesis, publication, video, artwork, etc.) in a single digital file. If the project is a video, provide a YouTube or Vimeo link in a Word or PDF document briefly describing your project and referencing your link.
  2. Mitchell Video Prompt
  3. A one to two page CV or resume highlighting activities and achievements during your years of study at UT.
  4. A scanned copy of your academic summary available through the Texas One Stop at no cost.
  5. The UT Co-op George H. Mitchell Student Statement is to be completed in Interfolio.
  6. The faculty recommendation form. Please do not request a recommendation letter via Interfolio.
  7. The Official UT Austin Applicant Screening Questions and UT Austin Applicant Source forms will be completed in Interfolio. Although these forms are primarily used for university-wide faculty recruitment, they must be completed to finalize your application.

All of the above materials must be uploaded and your application submitted no later than March 26, 2025 11:59 p.m. CST. 


Frequently Asked Questions:

May I submit more than one project? 

Students may submit only one project per year of applying for the Co-op/Mitchell award.

May I co-submit a project with another student?

Yes, co-submissions are accepted. Only one student should submit the application on behalf of the team. Only one letter of recommendation should be submitted for the team. 

May I submit a project that involves research/activities not completed at UT?

Yes, as long as the work was completed while you were a UT student. A letter of recommendation from a UT faculty member is still required.

May I submit more than one letter of recommendation?

No, only one letter of recommendation should be submitted per application. In the event that more than one faculty member supervised your work, they may co-write a letter of recommendation.

2024 UT Co-op George H. Mitchell Award Recipients

Josíah Garza

Award: $7,000
Major: Music Composition and Biology
Category: Grand Prize, Artistic/Creative
Winning Project: Maria

Anirudh Sudarshan

Award: $7,000
Major: Neuroscience Honors
Category: Grand Prize, Social Sciences
Winning Project: Analysis of Geographic Accessibility of Breast, Lung, and Colorectal Cancer Screening Centers Among American Indian and Alaskan Native Tribes

Melanie Quintero, Tuan Nguyen, Ana Metelski, Elizabeth Kinerk, Katherine Le

Award: $5,000
Category: Artistic/Creative
Winning Project: Palace of Poetry

Arianne Ohman

Award: $5,000
Major: Plan II and International Relations and Global Studies
Category: Humanities
Winning Project: Contemporary Art as a Political Tool in Modern China

Nikita Kakkad

Award: $5,000
Major: Plan II and Biomedical Engineering Honors
Category: Social Science
Winning Project: Reproductive Health in Texas Post-Dobbs: Physician Narratives

Lars Deutz

Award: $5,000
Major: Neuroscience Honors
Category: STEM
Winning Project: Membrane extraction in native lipid nanodiscs reveals dynamic regulation of Cdc42 complexes during cell polarization

2024 George H. Mitchell Award – Special Recognition

Jersey Robinson

Award: $1,625
Major: Radio-Television-Film
Category: Artistic/Creative
Project: The Practice Session

Bradon Foskett

Award: $1,625
Major: Music
Category: Humanities
Project: Pretty and Problematic: The Use of Music in Guadagnino’s “Call Me by Your Name”

Michell Magnus Ducloux

Award: $1,625
Major: Plan I Honors, French, and Humanities
Category: Social Sciences
Project: The Racialization of Hispanic Undergraduates and the Subordination of Spanish at the University of Texas at Austin: Explorations and Recommendations

Nirmal Patel

Award: $1,625
Major: Physics Honors
Category: STEM
Project: Physics Informed Neural Networks for Calculating Quasi-Normal Modes of Schwarzschild Black Holes

Year Award Name Category
2023 $7,000 Stephane Hatgis-Kessel STEM
2023 $7,000 Amtul-noor Rana Social Science
2023 $5,000 Benjamin Cervantes Artistic/Creative
2023 $5,000 Katherine Faulkner STEM
2023 $5,000 Sophia Kontos Humanities
2023 $5,000 Emma Gueorguieva Social Science
2023 $1,625 Thomas Jennings Artistic/Creative
2023 $1,625 Neel Nagarajan STEM
2023 $1,625 Amanda Figueroa-Nieves Humanities
2023 $1,625 Sarah Syamken Social Sciences
2022 $7,000

Aniket Sanghi

>STEM
2022 $7,000

Alexandria Passanisi

Artistic/Creative
2022 $6,000

Vivek Ramanathan

STEM
2022 $5,000

John Prado

Humanities
2022 $5,000

Amelia Mercado

Social Sciences
2022 $5,000

Alex Cao and Caleb Zhang

Artistic/Creative
2022 $1,625

Matthew Santoso

STEM
2022 $1,625

Megan Snopik

Humanities
2022 $1,625

Jackie Yang

Social Sciences
2022 $1,625

Macaella Gray and Zoe Roden

Artistic/Creative
2021 $3,000

Jeremian Abdullah

Artistic/Creative
2021 $3,000

Leonardo Di Bonaventura Altuve

Social Sciences
2021 $3,000

Joseph Guidry

STEM
2021 $3,000

Mark Simmons

Humanities
2020 $3,500 Ethan Russo Humanities
2020 $2,500 Austin Ali Artistic/Creative
2020 $2,500 Zoe de Beurs STEM
2020 $2,500 Maike Morrison STEM
2020 $2,500 Ishaana Talesara Social Sciences
2019 $12,000 Ariel Rebekah Barr STEM
2019 $5,000 Logan Pearce STEM
2019 $5,000 Scott Spivey Social Sciences
2019 $2,500 Aliyah Conley Humanities
2019 $2,500 Griffin Glenn STEM
2018 $12,000 Zahra Ahmed STEM
2018 $5,000 James Ding Social Sciences
2018 $5,000 Oluwaseun Olayiwola Artistic/Creative
2018 $2,500 Ashlie Martinez STEM
2018 $2,500 John Lin STEM
2017 $12,000 Luis Cataldo Humanities
2017 $5,000 Nathan Rebello STEM
2017 $5,000 Benjamin Stevenson Artistic/Creative
2017 $2,500 Gabrielle McRoberts Social Sciences
2017 $2,500 Bronwyn Scott STEM
2016 $10,000 Nell McKeown Humanities
2016 $3,000 Lillian Leone Social Sciences
2016 $3,000 Shelby Walford Sciences or Technology
2016 $3,000 Aydin Zahedivash Sciences or Technology
2016 $2,000 Mohnish Gandhi Social Sciences
2016 $2,000 Jaclyn Kachelmeyer Social Sciences
2016 $2,000 Macey Shay Humanities
2015 $10,000 Victoria Arnold Sciences or Technology
2015 $3,000 Ciaran Dean-Jones Humanities
2015 $3,000 Noor Momin Sciences or Technology
2015 $3,000 Thales Smith Artistic/Creative Project or Performance
2015 $2,000 Kaitlyn Kennedy Humanities
2015 $2,000 Nikita Klimovich Sciences or Technology
2015 $2,000 Nalin Ratnayeke Sciences or Technology
2014 $10,000 Lucy Kerr Humanities
2014 $3,000 Lindsay Mulford Social Sciences
2014 $3,000 Patrick Naeve Humanities
2014 $2,000 Lucy Junker Humanities
2014 $2,000 Casey Nice Humanities
2013 $12,500 Victor Vu Science and Technology
2013 $12,500 Katherine Noble Artistic and Creative
2013 $5,000 Isaac Gomez Artistic and Creative
2013 $5,000 Andrew Wortham Social Sciences
2013 $2,000 Ashty Karim Science and Technology
2013 $2,000 Leon Dean Science and Technology
2013 $2,000 Hannah Waitt Humanities

Application Support

The University of Texas at Austin is using an Interfolio product to collect award applications. Applicants to this position receive a Dossier account and can send all application materials, including confidential letters of recommendation, free of charge.


For help signing up, accessing your account, or submitting your application please check out Interfolio’s help and support section or get in touch via email at help@interfolio.com or phone at (877) 997-8807.