This year’s President’s Medalist is both a musician and a scientist. Brooks Erin Miner, a native of Alaska, majored in zoology but studied jazz piano with Music Professor Marc Seales. And though he plans to continue in science as a career, he says music is much more than a hobby. “It is a lifetime pursuit to which I will always be drawn.”

The President’s Medal is given to the top senior in the graduating class, although this isn’t necessarily the student with the highest grade point. The medalist is judged on his or her overall academic record, including grades. Miner posted a 3.92 GPA.

This isn’t the first time Miner has been honored at the highest level. He was the Sophomore Medalist in 2000–2001. The recipient of a Mary Gates Endowment for Students Honors Scholarship, he has taken advantage of a number of research opportunities, including two field trips to Barrow, Alaska to study migratory birds.

This summer Miner plans to travel to Greenland, again to study birds, but he’ll follow that trip with another — this time to Cuba as part of a Comparative History of Ideas program.

There, he’s looking forward to hearing Afro-Cuban jazz. Miner plans graduate study in evolutionary biology, but not until after he spends a year doing biological research in Seattle and also performing jazz.

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