CFAES students honored with university-level awards

Leadership Awards

Congratulations to the CFAES students who received university-level Student Life Leadership Awards!    

Aishwarya Badiger

Scarlet, Gray, and Green Student Leadership Award

A food science and technology graduate student from India, Aishwarya has pursued a variety of opportunities to create a more sustainable campus culture. Prior to COVID-19, she led a project to make the Parker Dairy Store café a zero-waste facility in partnership with the Zero Waste team in Ohio State's Facilities and Operations Development unit, including securing a grant to offset the cost of compostable materials. After the pandemic shut down the café, she pivoted to launch a compost drop-off pilot program serving 100 students.

Aishwarya co-founded the sustainability student organization Know Food Waste and was also involved in planning and executing the group’s Food Waste Photo Competition, which spread awareness of food waste on campus in a creative manner. She is currently working on a project to upcycle wasted bagels on campus into bagel chips in partnership with the Food Recovery Network and Upcycled Food Association. 

We look forward to seeing what she does next to further sustainability at Ohio State.  

Anna Haught

Scarlet, Gray, and Green Student Leadership Award   

As a community mentor in Off-Campus and Commuter Student Services (OCCSS), Anna has worked hard to make sustainable practices a part of everyday life for Buckeyes. 

A psychology and environmental policy and decision making double major from Columbus, Anna has held multiple events for commuter students around sustainability, including education on what is recyclable in Franklin County and the impact students can have by reducing waste on and off campus. They also worked on the sustainability campaign project, through which they developed a blog called Reduce, Reuse, Recipe to teach students creative recipes that reduce food waste, how to cook sustainably, and how to properly store leftovers to reduce food waste. Anna partnered with Best Food Forward to develop nutrition labels for the blog. Based on student feedback and engagement, the blog is expanding, including creating instructional videos for recipes.

Anna also makes sure that they center sustainability in all conversations with the OCCSS staff, helping make the office culture one that is truly more sustainable than before they joined the team. 

Annika Diaz

Outstanding Senior Award

Annika is an animal sciences major with a specialization in bioscience from Upland, California. She is focused on tackling underrepresentation in the STEM field.

As a leadership team member for the Animal Sciences Community Alliance, Annika has not only mentored many peers but has used her role to advocate for increased structural diversity and inclusion efforts. She has also been active in STEM education, outreaching at a local elementary school in Columbus, for which she found such a passion that she founded a student organization, Scientific Thinkers at Ohio State, to further create access for STEM outreach in other Columbus elementary schools.

After graduation, Annika plans to pursue graduate studies in molecular virology, focusing on better understanding the pathogenesis of emerging zoonotic viral diseases. Her ultimate goal in pursuing graduate training is to improve the prevention and treatment methods available for humans and animals to advance global public health. 

To see the complete list of university-level Student Life Leadership Awards, click here!