Notables

Saria Bechara, a doctoral student in social work at the WashU Brown School, has been named a 2026 Excellence, Equity and Inclusion Fellow by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.

Four students will serve as delegates to the WashU Board of Trustees for the 2026-27 academic year. Student delegates serve as non-voting participants in board meetings for a one-year term, providing a student perspective. 

Six WashU Medicine nurses were recognized with 2026 Excellence in Nursing awards from St. Louis Magazine, and an additional 12 were selected as finalists.

Mark R. Rank, WashU’s Herbert S. Hadley Professor of Social Welfare, is a winner of the NYC Big Book Award in the sociology category for his book “The Random Factor: How Chance and Luck Profoundly Shape Our Lives and the World Around Us.”

Naomi Kim-Yu, a doctoral candidate in English and a Lynne Cooper Harvey Fellow in American culture studies, both in WashU Arts & Sciences, has won a Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship.

Vincent Mellnick, MD, has been named senior vice chair and division director of academic practice and Malak Itani, MD, has been named section chief of abdominal imaging. Both are faculty members in WashU Medicine Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology.

Pamela Barmash, interim chair of Jewish, Islamic and Middle Eastern studies in WashU Arts & Sciences, has been elected president of the National Association of Professors of Hebrew.

Angela Coonce, chief of the WashU Police Department, will be inducted as an inaugural member of the new Harris-Stowe State University Athletic Hall of Fame. She was selected for excellence and leadership on and off the basketball court at her alma mater.

Thomas Ciesielski, MD, an associate professor in the John T. Milliken Department of Medicine at WashU Medicine, has been named the 2026–27 Presidential Fellow in Healthcare Safety and Quality by Joint Commission, a national accrediting organization.

Sociologist Elizabeth Chiarello, in WashU Arts & Sciences, was honored by both the American Sociological Association and the Institute for Advanced Study for her work at the intersection of patient care and criminal justice.