MADDIE STEPHENS
HONORS PORTFOLIO
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
August 2019 - moved in, completed freshmen orientation, joined the Matthew 25 Project, and began classes
​
September - joined American Chemical Society
​
October - joined Pre-Health Professionals Club
​
December - survived my first finals week at Drury and completed my first semester on campus
​
January 2020 - began my second semester on campus
​
May - completed my first year at Drury
​
June - formally accepted into the Honors Program
​
August 2020 - began working as a medical screener at Mattax Neu Prater Eye Center: my first ever healthcare job
​
September - attended my first ever honors student association event
​
October - enjoyed attending a Drury University play, as well as choir concerts at Missouri State University
​
April - enjoyed volunteering through several community events with Drury's American Chemical Society and Pre-Health Professionals organizations
May - completed my second year at Drury University
​
August 2021 - began my third year at Drury
​
January 2022 - enrolled in my first honors option contract
​
April - presented at Fusion Day
​
May - completed my second year at Drury University
​
July - decided to study anemia and comorbidity risk for my honors project and selected my directing faculty member as Dr. Day
​
August - enrolled in my second honors option contract and began my fourth and final year of undergrad at Drury
​
December - presented at my first honors symposium
​
March 2023 - attended my first honors conference and was selected as a member of Drury University's PA class of 2025
​
April 2023 - presented my honors project at Fusion Day
​
​
HONORS CLASSES
Spring 2020
This course was an honors, co-taught fusion class focused on the discussion of books and films relating to the topic of conspiracy theories and storytelling, where each participant was responsible for informing their fellow classmates on a conspiracy theory of their choosing, responding to in-class writing prompts, creating a fairytale, writing a conspiracy debunking paper, examining Holocaust denial on an academic level, as well as, collaborating with their
classmates during weekly in-class discussions and group assignments. This course also examined a variety of solutions for complex, modern-day problems such as a lack of access to honest and unbiased academic sources by learning about information literacy, logical fallacies, academic hoaxes, and cognitive biases. We learned about the evolutionary purposes of storytelling, the growing appeal of conspiracy theories, their psychological and sociological factors, and how these two important aspects of human life have been impacted by biases and fallacies. By the end of this course, I had learned how to able to debunk and identify conspiracy theories, biases, and fallacies. This course accomplished examining class topics from multiple perspectives and disciplinary approaches, gaining critical problem-solving, reading, thinking, writing, and leadership skills, and identifying legitimate, academic sources for literary research. Over the duration of this course, many non-fiction works were analyzed and discussed, including two novels, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human by Jonathan Gottschall and The Classic Fairy Tales by Maria Tatar et al., a variety of scholarly articles and videos, and one chosen film.
​
The assignment I chose to highlight from this course was my conspiracy debunking paper over the controversial National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Apollo 11 moon landing on July 20, 1969, which according to believers of this well-known conspiracy theory was propaganda released by the United States to gain credit for winning the highly competitive space race against Russia’s space program. Through this assignment, I utilized the definition and anatomy of a conspiracy theory to learn more about the characteristics of this conspiracy’s believers, such as a majority being less than 25 years in age, and their evidence for thinking the moon landing was staged, like the inconsistencies found among the American flag angles, stars and craters, lighting, shadows, and cameras. I also gained knowledge about the origin of this conspiracy, which began with a pamphlet released, ironically, by former NASA employee Bill Kaysing in 1976. Lastly, I was able to use the class content, such as information literacy, logical fallacies, and cognitive biases, to identify academic sources for my analysis and debunk the moon landing hoaxers’ arguments, one “starless” photo at a time.
I enjoyed taking the genetics honors seminar in the spring of 2020. Despite the interruptions that the COVID-19 pandemic caused, my group led by senior Kayla Day were able to meet virtually through Zoom to discuss all things genetics, including the book we decided to read, "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks," which details the life of the African American woman that had cervical cancer and the source of the unethically sourced, commonly used cell-line He-La, which allowed us to discuss the significance of the healthcare industry and ethics. We also read the 10,000 Year Explosion: How Civilization Accelerated Human Evolution, which allowed us to discuss the emergence of certain genes and how the human population has played a role. My group consisted of Biochemistry and Biology majors, which made for interesting discussions that prepared us for our future careers. We also had a meeting to wrap up the honors seminar dedicated to discussing primary literature we found interesting within the field of genetics. The artififact I selected from this class is the final synopsis I wrote regarding Stephen Friend's TED Talk entitled, "The Hunt for Unexpected Genetic Heroes," which discusses the future of genetic engineering and the hunt for those that have desirable genes.