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Pictured (from left): Mary Faith Wilson, Skylar Hodson, and Vanessajane Bayna. 

By: Dr. Andrew Yox, Honors Director

As in 2022, scholars of Honors �������� have won the top student prize of the East Texas Historical Association.  For their panel, “Entrenched Problems in Modern Texas History,” four NTCC sophomores won $300 for the best student panel at the association’s plenary fall conference. The meeting occurred in Nacogdoches, 26-28 September at the Fredonia Hotel. 

Honors Director, Dr. Andrew Yox noted: “We are elated. We are thankful again to the ETHA for judging this contest, and for our many supporters who make

 happenings like this possible.  What has been won before by students from Texas A&M at College Station, and the University of Houston, has been won again by our students. We had an incredible team of essayists-- Vanessajane Bayna, Alison Majors, and Skylar Hodson who have all won major state and national awards.  We also had a remarkable chair for the panel, Mary-Faith Wilson, who like Majors is a recent Leader of Promise winner.”      

The three essays for the panel were all developed in the fall of 2023 in the Texas history portion of the honors BioTex seminar at NTCC.  Bayna’s work is about the politics of oil, and is the basis for the current honors film. Majors’ work covered exclusivity in Texas history, and Hodson’s work, the history of film in Texas. All three essays have also been featured at several venues, including the Mount Pleasant Library, the meeting of the Great Plains Honors Council, and the end-of-the year McGraw Hill and Red River Symposium poster contests. Alison Majors, one of the essayists, was unable to attend the conference because of illness.  Dr. Andrew Yox presented her work in her place during the meeting. 

Bayna, Hodson, and Majors all reside in Titus County.  Wilson resides in Gilmer.