Biology recognizes two outstanding seniors with Haymaker Award
Friday, May 16, 2025
The Division of Biology has awarded Emily Burnett, senior in environmental biology and science, Overland Park, and Grace Schieferecke, senior in medical microbiology, Eudora, the 2025 H.H. Haymaker Award for Excellence.
The Haymaker Award is the highest honor given to a student by K-State’s Division of Biology. The award was named in honor of Herbert Henley Haymaker, a K-State alumnus who graduated with a bachelor's degree in agronomy and served as a faculty member from 1917-1963.
The award is given annually to one or two seniors majoring in biology, microbiology, or fisheries, wildlife, conservation, and environmental biology. The recipient must have an extraordinary level of accomplishment as an undergraduate and promise to continue such quality performance in a biological sciences-related career.
Nomination and selection criteria include grades, rigor of academic program, extracurricular activities, recommendations by faculty and performance in an interview.
This year, the two recipients were selected from a pool of eight nominees.
Emily Burnett
Burnett is an accomplished student who has excelled both academically and in research. Burnett joined the laboratory of Walter Dodds, University Distinguished Professor and Edwin and Lilian G. Brychta Chair in Biology, during her freshman year. Dodds noted that Burnett demonstrated leadership in the laboratory early on, since she was a freshman/sophomore, characterizing her laboratory work as exemplary.
In the laboratory, Burnett has proven to be an independent, intelligent, insightful and enthusiastic researcher. Her work included research on bison and cattle effects on riparian vegetation and stream sediments, and Burnett presented several posters describing her research at a variety of conferences. In 2025, she co-authored a publication in the journal Rangelands.
A 2023 recipient of the Division of Biology’s Most Promising Student award, Burnett has also excelled as a biology mentor and student ambassador. In pursuit of her goal to be an environmental educator, Burnett has worked with the Custer State Park in North Dakota, interned at the National Park Service at Zion National Park and at Audubon of Kansas.
After graduation, Burnett will begin a position at the Environmental Education Center at the Indiana Dunes National Park leading educational classroom and outdoor programs.
Grace Schieferecke
Schieferecke has proven herself to be an excellent researcher, first studying host-pathogen interactions and later virology. As a K-INBRE scholar, Schieferecke also conducted research in the lab of Jeba Jesudoss Chelladurai, assistant professor of parasitology.
She has assisted as an undergraduate practicum student with the Phages Hunters course instructed by Martha Smith-Caldas, teaching professor in biology. Smith-Caldas noted Schieferecke’s positive attitude, critical thinking and outstanding engagement with the students. Under the mentorship of Justin Kastner, professor of diagnostic medicine/pathobiology, Schieferecke also led an honors research project related to the history of public health. She explored scientific contributions of the 19th-century scientists by conducting historical research at the National Library of Medicine on the National Institutes of Health campus in Bethesda, Maryland.
Schieferecke is a past recipient of the June Hull Sherrid Award, the Kirmser Undergraduate Research Freshman Award, the Equitable Excellence National Award, the Phyllis J. Hunley Females in STEM Award and the Most Promising Student in Biology award. She has represented the division as a biology ambassador, including as president of the organization this past year.
After graduation, Schieferecke will begin medical school at the University of Kansas School of Medicine.