College of Agriculture and Life Sciences undergraduate Jessica Badger of Fayetteville, a junior majoring in microbiology, has won a prestigious Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship for the 2006-07 academic year.

Badger is among 323 recipients of the honor. They were selected

from a field of 1,081 mathematics, science and engineering students who were nominated by the faculties of colleges and universities nationwide. The awards are based on academic merit and cover the cost of tuition, fees, books, and room and board up to a maximum of $7,500 per year.

Badger is a Park Scholar and member of the University Honors

Program. She won a National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates award and last summer worked in chemistry and biochemistry labs at the University of Montana, where she will return to continue her research this year. She has worked with Dr. Amy Grunden in N.C. State's Department of Microbiology. Badger plans to specialize in proteomics in graduate school and become a professor.

Goldwater Scholarship selections are made by the board of trustees of the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation, a federally endowed agency established in 1986 to foster and encourage outstanding students to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences and engineering.

Twenty-seven N.C. State students have received the coveted Goldwater Scholarships since the program's inception.

-NCSU News Services