Top scholars from Vanderbilt University’s undergraduate and professional schools are being honored with Founder’s Medals during Commencement on Friday, May 11.

Elizabeth Reeves Covington, from Houston, Texas, Founder’s Medalist for the Graduate School, is graduating with a doctor of philosophy. Covington’s multidisciplinary background in science and the humanities inspired her to write her dissertation on the influence of late-19th- and early 20th-century experimental psychological theories of memory on early 20th-century British literature. Covington was the Elizabeth E. Fleming dissertation fellow at the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities, where she was also one of the inaugural fellows at the Center for the Study of Religion and Culture. She served as president of the English Graduate Student Association. She received the English department’s Duncan Award for Overall Achievement in the Graduate Career and Young Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching. She teaches gifted high school students at the Vanderbilt Summer Academy. This fall, Covington will be a lecturer in the English department at Vanderbilt. She plans to pursue a tenure-track job as a professor of English and ready her work on literature and memory for publication as a book.

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