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Date: 2 p.m., February 22, 1998
Two Seniors Receive Pyne Prize, Highest Undergraduate Honor
PRINCETON, N.J., February 22 -- Seniors Shalani Alisharan and Julia Lee were named co-winners of the M. Taylor Pyne Prize, the highest general distinction conferred on a Princeton undergraduate, at Alumni Day ceremonies held on the Princeton University campus today.
Alisharan is a psychology major from Vancouver, B.C., and Lee, of Los Angeles, Calif., is an English major also earning a certificate in European Cultural Studies. The prize they shared is a memorial to Moses Taylor Pyne, a member of the Class of 1877.
Alisharan recently received the Daniel M. Sachs Class of 1960 Scholarship, which supports two years of graduate study. She plans to earn a master's degree in neuroscience, or some other branch of psychology, at Worcester College, Oxford University, with an eye toward an eventual career in academic psychology.
Her senior thesis examines neuronal characteristics of the ventral premotor cortex in monkeys.
At Princeton, Alisharan has been active in the Black Arts Company, both as a dancer and as the group's business manager. A tutor and project manager at the University's Community House, she works with Hamilton Township, N.J., youngsters aged six to 13. She is also a board member of Stevenson Hall.
Alisharan's parents are Robert and Patricia Alisharan of Vancouver.
Lee is writing her thesis on George Eliot's Middlemarch, particularly the way in which science pervades Eliot's writing.
A dancer and choreographer with Expressions Dance Company for three years, Lee is also a performing pianist and disc jockey of a classical music show on WPRB, the campus radio station. Through the Student Volunteers Council, she organized "Music for the Elderly," whereby student musicians entertain at local convalescent homes. In addition to being a resident adviser in Forbes College, she initiated a "salon" -- a weekly intellectual discussion open to all undergraduates, with occasional faculty guests.
She won a Martin A. Dale '52 Sophomore Summer Award to visit National Trust estates, study horticulture and work in botanical gardens in England. Lee hopes eventually to attend graduate school in English literature.
Her parents are David and Sonia Lee of Los Angeles.
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