Materials Science, Engineering & Commercialization Alum Receives 2022-2023 Texas State Outstanding Dissertation Award

Each year, The Graduate College awards doctoral students from four different categories on a rotating basis with the Texas State Outstanding Dissertation Award. The four awarded categories are a) Mathematics, Physical Sciences and Engineering, b) Humanities and Fine Arts, c) Social Sciences, Business, and Education, and d) Biological and Life Sciences. Students are nominated by faculty members from their respective programs and are carefully selected by the committee.

This year’s winner of the Outstanding Dissertation Award in the Mathematics, Physical Sciences, and Engineering division is Dr. Joyce Anderson. Dr. Anderson’s path to earning her doctoral degree was unique. After graduating with her master’s degree about 30 years ago, Dr. Anderson decided to pursue her Ph.D.

“I was kind of an unusual grad student,” Dr. Anderson said. “There was a significant gap between when I had finished my master’s degree and when I started my Ph.D. My daughters were in college [when] I started [school] back up again.”

That gap did not stop Dr. Anderson from succeeding. Her dissertation, which investigated the thermal properties of nanostructured materials and developed a technique to directly measure them, could be revolutionary for scientists in her field.

“Over the past many decades, electronics have been getting smaller and smaller. Everything is getting miniaturized and, as a result of that, there are a lot of challenges,” Dr. Anderson said. “The downside is that when you have all these devices crammed into a small area they generate a lot of heat, and it’s very difficult to dissipate that heat over time. There aren’t a lot of direct measurements of materials that are that small. Scientists and engineers have had to rely on theoretical models to predict what those properties are. What would be really helpful and what, hopefully, my research will help people do is [develop] a technique that allows you to directly measure those thermal properties.”

The process of developing these measurement techniques was a hard-fought battle for Dr. Anderson. “It was a whole lot of dead ends,” she said. “You really get yourself immersed in the process, and of course, I questioned myself, [wondering] ‘Why am I doing this? This is crazy.’”

In the end, Dr. Anderson believes it was her ability to celebrate the small wins and build a supportive community that helped her power through and earn her Ph.D. Dr. Anderson was skeptical of her ability to find comrades upon joining the doctoral program at Texas State but soon found her peers to be welcoming and a great source of comfort throughout her journey.

“My earliest concerns about starting the program were that everyone was just going to look at me and think, ‘Who is this middle-aged woman? Why is ‘Mom’ here?’” Dr. Anderson said. “But my fellow students were so awesome, and we worked on projects and struggled together.”

Dr. Anderson’s success is an inspiration to others to pursue their dreams regardless of where they are in life.

“I hope that people realize that it’s not too late,” she said. “I did not take a traditional path to get here, [but] I learned a lot not only about science but about myself.”

If you are a currently enrolled non-traditional student, the Non-Traditional Student Organization offers many resources to help you along your journey at Texas State. For more information, please visit the Non-Traditional Student Organization webpage or stop by the NTSO lounge on the 4th floor of the LBJ Student Center, Suite 4-3.1.