ECU Alumni Association names 2021 Robert H. Wright Alumni Leadership Award recipients
The East Carolina University Alumni Association selected five student recipients of the 2021 Robert H. Wright Alumni Leadership Award. The award recognizes students’ academic achievement as well as commitment to leadership and integrity. It is the most prestigious award presented by the ECU Alumni Association.
The award’s namesake, Robert H. Wright, was the first president of East Carolina Teachers College and honors his legacy of using leadership to influence positive change. The recipients will be honored during ECU’s spring commencement ceremony.
“We are so proud of the 2021 Robert Wright Award recipients. We all know Pirates have grit and resilience, and it is an honor for the ECU Alumni Association to recognize these students for their commitment to excellence in this historic year. They truly represent the spirit of the Pirate Nation,” said Scott Francis, associate vice chancellor for alumni relations.
2021 Recipients
Adam Butler
Adam Butler of Roseboro is an Honors College student and public health major with a minor in mathematics and natural science.
This civic-minded Pirate has been a member of the student organization Pirates Promoting Community Wellness for three years and has participated in numerous local community health volunteer events, including traveling to Honduras to assist with free health clinics.
Butler also worked as a tutor with the Pirate Academic Success Center and as a volunteer for READ ENC, a child literacy coalition in Pitt County that provides children’s books to pediatric medial office waiting areas, barbershops and other community spaces.
Butler will attend the Brody School of Medicine in the fall and plans to return to his hometown as a family medicine physician.
Jamie Chamberlin
Jamie Chamberlin of Greenville is an EC Scholar majoring in biochemistry and chemistry.
She is an Early Assurance Scholar to the Brody School of Medicine through ECU’s Honors College.
Chamberlin is one of two ECU GlaxoSmithKline Women in Science Scholars, a program that promotes supporting and retaining women in science fields. She has been involved in a variety of research projects as an undergraduate, on topics ranging from the conductivity of fuel cells to children’s oral health outcomes after early life exposure to lead.
In addition, she volunteered at various clinics in the Greenville area that provide free health care to members of marginalized communities in order to help increase uniform access to medical care.
Victoria Chan
Victoria Chan of Holly Springs is a double major in public health and psychology.
This EC Scholar is passionate about her work with the Jack Minges Unit of the Boys & Girls Club, where she created a Power Hour Mentoring Program and facilitated the SMART (Skills, Mastery, and Resilience Training) Girls program. SMART Girls is a health, fitness, prevention/education and self-esteem enhancement program designed to meet the developmental needs of girls.
Chan also organized the Books that Embrace Race Fundraiser to purchase and donate children’s books that feature people of color. EC Scholars donated over 1,000 books to the ECU Community School, where Chan also teaches weekly art classes. And with support from the EC Scholars program, she studied abroad in Hong Kong, her ancestral home.
Chan will attend medical school after graduation.
William Richard Guiler
William Richard Guiler of Charlotte is a double major in psychology and multidisciplinary studies – neuroscience.
Guiler was named a 2020 Goldwater Scholar, one of the most prestigious and oldest national scholarships in the natural sciences, mathematics and engineering. He served as a mentor for the International Precollege Association for Research in STEM, helping engage middle and high school students in research.
Guiler is also an advocate for raising awareness of racial and mental health issues. He has worked alongside ECU staff to advocate and plan programs for suicide awareness and prevention and organized the ECU Coming Together Initiative, a campuswide event to break down race, ethnicity and gender barriers among students.
After graduation, Guiler plans to enroll in a neuroscience doctoral program.
Dana Shefet
Dana Shefet of Cary is a public health major with minors in mathematics, nutrition and composite natural sciences.
Since her freshman year, Shefet has been a researcher in the Food-based Early Education (FEEd) Lab, a program that focuses on childhood overweight prevention.
Shefet studied abroad in London as an intern with the British Heart Foundation, writing articles published in the national Heart Matters magazine. She also spent a summer at Yale University’s Sherwin B. Nuland Summer Institute in Bioethics. While there, she worked on a research project that was accepted for a 2021 presentation at the UNESCO World Conference in Bioethics, Medical Ethics & Health Law.
Shefet plans to attend the Brody School of Medicine to pursue a career in family medicine.