Spears wins student research award

On April 29 and 30, eight Cal State San Marcos students attended the 19th annual CSU Student Research Competition at CSU Sacramento. More than 190 students from 22 California State University campuses attended, competing in 23 different divisions.

One of the two Cal State San Marcos students who won an award was Matt Spears, a 20-year-old senior from Fallbrook who won second place in Humanities & Letters, undergraduate division, for “The Canonicity of Cliché: Idiomatic Language and Formulaic Diction in Beowulf and the Heaney Translation.” His faculty mentor is Lance Newman, literature and writing studies. Spears will graduate in spring 2006. He plans to pursue a PhD in English literature with the goal of becoming a college professor.

The system-wide competition showcases excellent research conducted by CSU undergraduate and graduate students in all academic disciplines. Student participants made oral presentations before juries of professional experts from major corporations, foundations, public agencies and colleges and universities in California.