McKenna Davis credits educators in the Westerville City School District for inspiring her to pursue a career in physics.
Rhodes College junior McKenna Davis is among 240 sophomores and juniors nationwide selected as Goldwater Scholars for the 2017-2018 academic year. Established by Congress in 1986 to honor Barry M. Goldwater, a five-term United States senator, the Goldwater Foundation provides scholarships to highly qualified college students who intend to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences, and engineering. Students cannot apply for the scholarship, but rather must be nominated by their institutions.
A physics and mathematics major from Westerville, Davis was part of a gravitational physics research project at the University of Birmingham, UK, in the summer of 2016. She then studied abroad in the Budapest Semesters in Mathematics program in Budapest, Hungary, the fall semester of 2016. She has published two research papers on force and capacitance approximations for charged spheres of equal size with Dr. Shubho Banerjee of Rhodes College—one in the annual journal published by Electrostatic Society of America and one in the journal of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Davis is a member of Rhodes’ Society of Physics Students, Women in Physics, and Alpha Omicron Pi Women’s Fraternity. She also plays on the varsity women’s lacrosse team. She plans to pursue a Ph.D. in gravitational physics while conducting research on noise reduction in gravitational wave detectors.
“Winning this scholarship is a dream come true for me. It reflects not only my own hard work, but the investments of all those who care about me and have supported me throughout my academic career,” says Davis. “This is as much an honor for my friends and family, advisors, and instructors as it is for me, and I am incredibly thankful.”
Davis, 20, moved to Westerville in 2007 from Mesa, Arizona. She attended Genoa Middle School, where she credits then-principal Suzanne Kile for getting her into the right classes, including some at Westerville Central High School. There, she was welcomed warmly, she says, by Principal Todd Spinner and taught by educators who inspired her, like Honors Algebra 2 teacher Jerry McSwords. With the guidance of Dr. Machelle Kline, Davis headed to Westerville South for high school and the International Baccalaureate (IB) program, which she started as a sophomore and finished after her junior year. Davis says IB Physics teacher Bill Heinmiller is the reason she decided to pursue physics, and she credits Sandra Priwer with honing her writing skills. Davis took classes at Ohio State and Otterbein during her senior year under the Post-Secondary Enrollment Options program.
While at South, Davis played varsity lacrosse for four years, soccer for two years, varsity tennis for two years, and was involved in theater and music. She was class valedictorian and a Columbus Dispatch Scholar Athlete. Her twin brothers, Conor and Evan, are currently seniors at Westerville Central. Her parents are Malcolm and Laurie Davis.
Founded in 1848, Rhodes is a private, coeducational college of liberal arts and sciences located in Memphis, Tenn. It aspires to graduate students with a lifelong passion for learning, a compassion for others, and the ability to translate academic study and personal concern into effective leadership and action in their communities and the world.