Lauren Kessler, a senior in crop sciences, spent the first two years of college at another institution, but soon realized that she missed horticulture and needed to follow her heart. At the beginning of her junior year, she transferred to the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences to study horticultural food systems.

As a PhD student in Agricultural and Consumer Economics advised by Dr. Kathy Baylis, Patrese Anderson is working with a multidisciplinary research team to understand climate change’s effects on smallholder farmers dependent on rain fed agricultural systems.

During the summer of 2017, she used funds provided by the ACES International Graduate Grants program to travel to Zambia to oversee the data collection of 1200 household surveys to be used by this research team to help Zambia ensure livelihoods and attain food security.  

Dennis Humberto Pinto Padilla, a M.S. student in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition advised by Dr. Nicki Engeseth, used funds from an ACES international graduate grant to find optimal conditions for producing chocolate in tropical regions.

Pinto’s research focuses on a problem that plagues tropical regions with chocolate – the temperature of storage is often too high, resulting in rapid bloom formation and melting. His goal is to find low-cost, low energy-requiring strategies for temperature stability and therefore better chocolate production in these regions.

Name: Tomas Tebarek
Major: Finance in Agribusiness
Scholarship: Jonathan M. and Judith D. Groesbeck Scholarship in Honor of Harold E. Dustin
Hometown: Wheaton, Ill.

How did you make the decision to attend the College of ACES and major in your chosen field?

The Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics Student Advising and Enrichment Center (SAEC) distinguishes ACE as a leader in student service. The center emphasizes four core principles: experiential learning, personalized advising, professional development, and career exploration.

Private gifts, including the Tom Frey Fund, have provided funding essential to making student services and programs available and financially accessible.

The following are a sampling of the opportunities made possible by the ACE Student Advising and Enrichment Center.

Teachers learn a lot about how to teach curriculum in college, but they don't get much training in helping very young children learn to handle frustration, anger, and excitement, skills that kids need for kindergarten readiness, said Nancy McElwain, a University of Illinois professor of human development and family studies who conducted a study on the topic.