Welcome

The Spring Spotlight at Washington and Lee University is a celebration of our students’ creativity, innovation, and scholarly achievements during the Spring Term.

This platform showcases a diverse array of projects, including multimedia presentations, research posters, podcasts, films, and digital stories, reflecting the dedication and intellectual curiosity of our student body.

Featured Spring 2025 Courses

ENV 295I: Indigenous Ethnogeography and Foodways

The "Food Systems: How Indigenous Cultures Demonstrate Survivance" poster explores how Indigenous food systems exemplify survivance—a concept defined as the active presence and resilience of Native cultures, rather than absence or victimhood. It highlights how Indigenous communities sustainably cultivate, share, and protect food sources while maintaining cultural knowledge and ecological balance. 01. Resourcefulness: Indigenous food systems are rooted in using every part of natural resources with care and intention. Shagbark Hickory: Nuts used for food, wood for tools and crafts, emphasizing ecological respect. Bear: Every part of the animal—meat, fat, fur, bones, claws—was used, often passed down in oral tradition with values of sustainability. Reciprocity is central—giving and receiving between humans and the environment. Water and Rice: The Anishinaabe formed a reciprocal relationship with water and wild rice, protecting habitats as they harvested. The Three Sisters: Corn, beans, and squash are grown together; each supports the others' growth physically and nutritionally, modeling interdependence. 03. Collective Continuance: Cultural survival relies on passing down practices that sustain the community and environment. Seed Keepers: Knowledge and seeds are preserved across generations to ensure food sovereignty and cultural identity. Foraging: Gathering wild foods and medicines maintains cultural traditions, biodiversity, and kinship with the natural world. Fish: Bones were ground into powder and consumed, showing a commitment to not wasting parts of animals.

ENGL 295A: Funny Women

BIOL 297K: Field Mammalogys

A research poster titled “When Cities Meet Wildlife: The Implication of Urban Development on Zoonotic Disease Risk” by Amara Oputa. The study explores how urbanization affects tick prevalence in small mammals and whether this relates to human Lyme disease cases. The introduction notes that habitat fragmentation from urban development can increase disease transmission and zoonotic risk, as small mammals often serve as reservoirs for ticks and pathogens. The hypothesis proposes that small mammals in urban NEON sites would have higher rates of tick presence, and that this would correlate with higher human Lyme disease cases in nearby counties. A map highlights 12 NEON sites classified as either urban or rural. Urban sites are within 60.34 miles of highly human-impacted areas, while rural sites are farther from disturbance. In the results, a bar graph shows a higher average percentage of tick-positive captures in urban sites (18%) compared to rural ones (6%), but the difference is not statistically significant. A scatterplot comparing small mammal tick presence with county-level human Lyme disease cases shows a weak correlation that is also not statistically significant. The conclusion emphasizes that while urban sites showed more tick presence in small mammals, the difference wasn’t statistically conclusive. There was also no strong correlation between tick presence in rodents and reported Lyme cases. However, the findings underscore the importance of continued monitoring, especially in urbanizing areas. The next steps include deeper pathogen analysis, mapping transmission hotspots, and using landscape metrics to explore host-parasite dynamics. Suggested applications include collaboration with city planners and wildlife managers to mitigate zoonotic disease risk. The poster includes figures illustrating disease transmission, graphs of data analysis, and logos for NEON, TickCheck, and NSF. An acknowledgment thanks Dr. Jessica LaPrice and mentions that NEON and TickCheck provided data resources.

BUS 362: Understanding Emerging Economies

Poster titled “The Emerging Economy of Argentina” by Sam Stelter, CJ Hovis, Jackson Brooks, and Jake Shaud. It outlines Argentina’s political landscape under President Javier Milei, high inflation rates (projected to drop from 219% in 2024 to 36% in 2025), and a representative democracy with poor global rankings in rights and legal efficiency. Culturally, it highlights tango and soccer. Features two pie charts on foreign direct investment by country and sector, a treemap of exports (led by soybeans, corn, and cars), and top trade partners including Brazil, China, and the U.S. Lists top 10 local brands like Mercado Libre and YPF. Notes foreign firm relationships, including joint ventures and land ownership limits.

BIOL 195D: Biology of Women

DANC 252: Vertical Dance

About the Spring Spotlight

The Spring Spotlight is an evolution of the traditional Spring Term Festival, designed to provide a more accessible and engaging platform for student work. By embracing digital mediums, we aim to reach a broader audience and offer flexible viewing opportunities beyond the constraints of a single event.

Explore Student Projects by Course

Navigate through the exceptional work produced by our students, organized by the courses in which they were developed. This structure offers insight into the academic contexts and objectives that shaped each project, allowing you to appreciate the depth and breadth of our curriculum.