Two LSU Honors Students Selected as Truman Finalists

May 2018

 

Morgan Johnson (left) and Madelyn Smith (right)

 

 

The LSU Roger Hadfield Ogden Honors College is proud to announce that Morgan Johnson, of Shreveport, La., and Madelyn Smith, of Lafayette, La., were selected as finalists for the prestigious Truman Scholarship.

Johnson is a senior studying political science and Spanish in the College of Humanities & Social Sciences; Smith is a junior studying natural resource ecology and management with a concentration in conservation biology in the College of Agriculture.

Both finalists are part of the Louisiana Service and Leadership, or LASAL, Scholars Program, which prepares Ogden Honors College students for leadership roles in Louisiana, particularly in the fields of public service, social justice and environmental sustainability. LASAL courses emphasize a multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving and research applied to real-world issues, workplace experience and discovery. Through the LASAL program, students develop an appreciation for society’s complex problems and a passion for solving them.

Johnson’s activism centers on criminal justice reform, specifically incarceration laws. In her policy proposal, she calls for the state of Louisiana to adopt legislation that requires inmates who are sentenced to five years or more to be housed in state prisons, thus ending the existence of local for-profit prisons. After graduation, she intends to pursue a JD at the University of California in Los Angeles’ Law School, specializing in critical race studies.

An Udall Scholar, Smith is the president and founder of the Sierra Student Coalition at LSU and recently self-published “Louisiana Gone,” a book of photography that documents coastal residents’ voices on their culture and land loss. She is also a research intern with “Coastal Voices,” an audio documentary series that explores the relationships between people, land and water in Louisiana. After graduation, she hopes to pursue a master’s degree in environmental management with a specialization in human dimensions at Yale University.

“These finalists represent the best LSU and the Ogden Honors College has to offer: leadership, service and serious policy solutions to major societal problems,” said Ogden Honors College Dean Jonathan Earle.

To read more about the policies proposed by the finalists, visit http://www.honors.lsu.edu/news/truman-nominees.

 

This article was adapted from a press release by LSU’s Jacqueline DeRobertis and Ernie Ballard. For the original article, please visit http://www.lsu.edu/mediacenter/news/2018/02/23trumanfinalists.eb.php.