Awards and Scholarships

We offer several awards, fellowships, scholarships, and honors for our undergraduate students, including study abroad scholarships. These programs honor the best and brightest students and are supported with the help of alumni and friends of the department. These endowments have an immeasurable impact on our students - they develop the next generation of leaders.

The Nation Award

Dr. Jack Nation (1948-2008) was a significant presence in the Psychology Department for more than 30 years.  Trained as an experimental psychologist for his Ph.D. degree at the University of Oklahoma, Jack began his research career in the field of learning, particularly operant conditioning.  But he later reinvented himself in the field of behavioral toxicology.  There he investigated the effects of heavy metals such as lead and cadmium on behavior and emotionality, using a rat model. His later work investigated how neurotoxicology could be applied to the study of drug abuse. Jack loved research, and his investigations were supported for many years by federal grants.  Yet he loved teaching as well.  He was arguably the best teacher in the Department and one of the two or three best in the entire University.  He loved the classroom but also the teaching he did in mentorship of those students – graduate, undergraduate, and high school – who worked in his research lab.  In his career at Texas A&M Jack won awards for both his teaching and his research, and he clearly exhibited the highest achievements in both areas.

Beginning in 2013, the Department presents an annual award to the most outstanding graduating senior in psychology – the Jack Nation Award.  This award is endowed by a very generous gift from Dr. Michael Shahnasarian, one of many graduate  students impacted by Jack’s work.

As the historian Henry Brooks Adams has told us, teachers affect eternity; they can never tell where their influence will end.

2018
Kathryn Hickl