Geography graduate students Alexandria McCombs, Jenny Hung, and Beth Nelson awarded funding from the USC Office of the Vice President for Research to support their dissertation research.

Each year, the USC Office of the Vice President for Research offers a competitive grant program for graduate students across the USC community. The Support to Promote Advancement of Research and Creativity (SPARC) program is a merit based award designed to fund graduate research across all disciplines for up to $5,000 for a 15 month period. Beside funding high quality research, the program is also an excellent opportunity to train students in developing competitive grant proposals.

The Department of Geography winners and their proposal titles are: Chen-Ling (Jenny) Hung, Storm Hydrographs in Two Subwatersheds of the Rocky Branch Watershed; Alexandria McCombs, Agricultural Land Use Change Effects on Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide in the US Great Plains; and Elizabeth Nelson, Algerians Communities in France: Place, Social Networks, and Integration.