Graduate Student Awards
The Graduate Student Awards encourage and recognize exemplary teaching by and service to graduate students and Carnegie Mellon. Recipients have displayed outstanding effectiveness in the classroom and have contributed to an improved quality of life for graduate students and the entire academic community. Awardees are recognized during the Celebration of Education Award Ceremony.
2023 Graduate Student Teaching Award
Đinh Ngọc Phượng (Phoebe)
She/They
Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Psychology
Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences
In their research, Phoebe blends cognitive science and philosophy of science to study the cognitive representations and processes that underlie people’s ability to learn new causal relations in the world, with a focus on participants in the U.S.
As an instructor, Phoebe recognizes the multi-directional and contextually embedded nature of learning and honors these through: collaborative projects, reflexive practice (including frequent student-driven course adjustments), and a syllabus that strives to upset white supremacist epistemology in psychology education. Drawing from evidence-based educational research (shout-out to the Eberly Center) and their experience in community event organizing, Phoebe aims toward a classroom environment in which students’ learning is co-created, justice-centered, and—if nothing else is working that day—fun.
At CMU, Phoebe taught research methods in cognitive psychology in fall 2022. Prior to that, they were a graduate teaching assistant for various introductory psychology courses.
Phoebe wholeheartedly believes that the making of a teacher is a communal process—as such, they want to thank their community elders, friends and co-conspirators and (importantly!) all of their students and mentees for helping them become the teacher-learner that they are today.
2023 Graduate Student Service Award
Annie Behre
Ph.D. Candidate, Biomedical Engineering
College of Engineering
Annie is a current fourth-year Ph.D. student of biomedical engineering (BME) who conducts research in the Regenerative Therapeutics and Biomaterials Group lab under the supervision of Dr. Adam Feinberg.
She graduated from Lehigh University in 2019 with a bachelor of science in bioengineering and directly went on to start her PhD at CMU in the fall of 2019. Her Ph.D, research is focused on using bioprinting to develop extracellular matrix hydrogel-based scaffold that can enhance wound healing and skeletal muscle regeneration in cases of irreversible soft tissue injuries, such as volumetric muscle loss. In 2021, Annie received a National Science Foundation (NSF) graduate research fellowship.
Annie has also been an integral part of the BME community, serving in various leadership positions such as the social chair and president of the Graduate Biomedical Engineering Society (GBMES), secretary and president for Women in BME, a BME graduate student rep for GSA, and a graduate student rep for the DEI committee. Furthermore, she enjoys sharing her knowledge and passion for science with younger generations through teaching courses on bioprinting and biomaterials for middle and high school students through the Gelfand Center and the Citizen Science Lab.
In her free time, Annie really enjoys going to group fitness classes such as yoga, spinning, [solidcore], and Orange Theory. During her undergrad, she also became a certified instructor for a Pilates-reformer type class. Annie is also an avid trivia fanatic and attends weekly bar trivia with her friends. Her favorite trivia category is “name that tune” music trivia. Although her team may not win much during trivia, it is one of the highlights of her week. Overall, Annie is a highly accomplished and driven individual who has made significant contributions to the BME department through her research and leadership roles and has a strong commitment to science education and outreach.