Jennifer Successfully Defended Her Thesis Today

Jennifer's thesis defense went well this afternoon. She started out a little awkwardly, but once she got past her second sentence she kicked into gear and spoke well; I've seen severe stage fright at these events in the past, and luckily she shook it off quickly. In the post-defense meeting with the full thesis committee (four members, plus an outside observer from Computer Science representing the Graduate Studies dean) we kicked around some ideas to make her thesis stronger. This was good, since I realize that I've been too close to this project and I'm grateful to Profs. Lawton and Wang (the latter from A&M) for their constructive criticisms for ways to improve the presentation of the work. This is especially useful for coming up with a version of the work for submission to a journal. So, once Jennifer incorporates these suggestions into her work she has fully completed the requirements for her Masters.

Next Wednesday Enrique defends his thesis, which focuses on differences in brain structure between male and female scarlet shiners. This will also be at 2 p.m., in room 107 in the Shelby Center.