Alumni successes

Brooke Sahni ’19

Cleveland, Ohio, native Brooke Sahni graduated from NMSU with her master of fine arts degree in creative writing. She wrote a 38-page book of poems titled “Divining” while working on her thesis at NMSU. Her book won the 2019 Orison Chapbook Prize and was published in July 2020.

“All of the poems in ‘Divining’ have been revised several times based on the feedback of my cohort at NMSU,” Sahni says. “We were a small group of three, just me, Jill Mceldowney, Caroline Chavatel and our teacher, (English professor) Connie Voisine. Their feedback along with NMSU graduate Tyler Julian and my undergraduate mentor Sheila Sanderson were invaluable in helping me make my poems stronger.”

In fall 2020, Sahni began teaching as an English instructor at Northern New Mexico College in Española, New Mexico, where she is using the skills she learned at NMSU to mentor and teach a new group of budding poets and writers.

Amanda Adame ’19

Lucia B. Chacón-Díaz ’17

Lucia B. Chacón-Díaz, who graduated from NMSU with a Ph.D. in curriculum and instruction with a focus on biology education research, was recognized in early 2020 with two prestigious awards.

Chacón-Díaz was named a recipient of the 2020 Jhumki Basu Scholar Award by the National Association for Research in Science Teaching. She will join the NARST Equity and Ethics Committee and present her research during the 2021 NARST International Conference in Orlando, Florida.

She also was named a 2020-21 AERA-Spencer Minority Meta-Analysis Fellow, engaging in meta-analysis research with a focus on science education. She will join a research panel at the 2021 AERA Annual Meeting to address the role of meta-analyses in building early career research programs.

While at NMSU, Chacón-Díaz was mentored by Susan Brown in the College of Education and Michèle Shuster in the College of Arts and Sciences. She is currently a STEM postdoc researcher in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Ohio State University.

Adriana M. Chávez ’19

Scott Crampton ’87 ’89

Scott Crampton, who spent 25 years as the baseball head coach at Lamar Community College in Lamar, Colorado, has been selected for the NJCAA Baseball Coaches Association 2020 Hall of Fame class. After 25 years and more than 1,000 wins, Crampton retired in 2018 and is LCC’s athletic director. Crampton played for the Aggies from 1983-1986 and was an assistant coach from 1987-1993 before becoming head coach at LCC.

“I was lucky enough to get my coaching start at NMSU and was able to make some lifelong friendships along the way,” he says. “The coaching and life lessons at NMSU are what molded me into the person I am today. I owe a lot to great players I was allowed to coach at NMSU in my six years as a coach.”

Crampton garnered NJCAA Region XI Coach of the Year honors nine times and led the Runnin’ Lopes to a school record for wins in 2002 with 59-5 record and a third-place finish at the JUCO World Series.

Tiffany Acosta