This year, Grace Wilson joined a proud legacy as the 2025 recipient of the Monsignor Bukowski Award
The Monsignor Bukowski Award, named in honor of the visionary first President of Aquinas College, was first presented in 1974. It stands as the highest honor bestowed upon a graduating senior from Aquinas College. The ideal recipient is profoundly committed to leadership, service, community, and academic excellence.
For Grace, these values were not abstract ideas but principles that shaped her experience at Aquinas.
She is graduating this year with a remarkable dual major in political science and international studies, complemented by a minor in English with a writing concentration. She has been actively involved in both the Collegiate Model United Nations and the Aquinas College High School Model United Nations Conference, demonstrating her leadership and diplomatic skills. Furthermore, she has been instrumental in supporting her fellow students and the wider Aquinas community through her dedicated work with the Writing Center, as well as serving as the Chief Editor for the 2025 edition of Magna Verba.
“She cares deeply about advocating for positive change in the world, and she is going to spend her life trying to make the world a better place,” shared Aquinas College Writing Center Coordinator Julie Bevins in Grace’s Senior Salute.
“Wide-Eyed” Freshman to Campus Leader and Beloved Community Member
In her powerful Bukowski Award essay, Grace included a poignant story about an early meeting with her advisor, Dr. Roger Durham, who asked her about her aspirations for the future. She wrote, “I came unprepared, wide-eyed and nervous. Doc, as I came to know him, came exceptionally prepared with an 18-page document and a host of questions I was ill-prepared to answer. ‘Where do you want to be in five years? In ten? In twenty?’”
She didn’t have the answers to those questions at this point, and that advising meeting lingered in her mind throughout a quiet first year. “I worked in admissions as a student ambassador for that whole year,” she explains. “But other than that, I kept mostly to myself.”
That lingering uncertainty started to fade in her sophomore year when she discovered Model UN and the Writing Center.
Model UN challenged her to assume the role of a global leader, representing countries like the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Palestine, Iraq, Morocco, Germany, and Saudi Arabia. Through these experiences, she sharpened her skills in diplomacy, leadership, and collaboration, learning to navigate complex negotiations and work with diverse delegations toward shared goals. In her Senior Salute, she cited the four-day trip to Chicago as her favorite AQ Memory. “It was the first time I’d left campus with a group of people,” she explained. “It made me a lot of really good friends.”
She also discovered new opportunities as a writing center consultant, working on Magna Verba and serving as a task force admin, which helped her get involved on campus. These experiences guided her to become a stronger writer, leader, communicator, and team member.
“Over time, I got to know more and more people, and it became a true community for me,” she expressed, “one I could turn to whenever I needed support, whether from the team or Julie.”
Finding Direction Through Study Abroad
While participation in Model UN, the Writing Center, and the Aquinas Admissions Office is enough to keep any college student sufficiently occupied, her involvement on campus didn’t end there!
In the years following the pandemic, fewer students signed up for study abroad opportunities, and those who did generally opted for the semester-long options, rather than the short-term programs. To help revive this essential part of campus life, Aquinas’ study abroad office began seeking out new ways to encourage participation. Grace found an opportunity to study in Poland through one of these emerging programs, becoming the first—and only—Aquinas student to do so.
In the summer of 2023, she joined eleven other university students from across the country and left the United States for the first time. Despite not knowing what to expect, she became a student participant in Kraków, Poland, studying Polish faith and culture, and volunteered at the English Immersion Summer Camp for Ukrainian Refugee Children.
She explained that because Poland neighbors Ukraine, many people fled there after Russia invaded. As a volunteer, she helped raise nearly $3,800 in donations to support these families. She also spent time with and taught six-year-old Ukrainian refugee girls, teaching them English and helping them reclaim some sense of normalcy in their lives.
“I’d always been interested in international politics,” she expressed, citing her earlier participation in Model UN. “But actually helping people and seeing these little girls who had faced such hardships… and being able to at least make somewhat of an impact in their lives… That definitely shaped my last two years here and drove what I wanted to do post-Aquinas.”
Grace’s Further Exploration of Refugee Treatment
When Grace returned to campus after her summer abroad, Dr. Durham approached her with another opportunity. He was interested in her experience in Ukraine and asked her to apply for the 2024 Summer Scholars Research Grant, which they later received.
With this funding, the two co-authored a paper entitled “The International Refugee Regime: An Analysis of Ukrainian Refugee Treatment in Poland, Germany, and Russia,” which was over 60 pages long and included over 400 footnotes. They then presented their research at the Michigan Political Science Association Conference in the fall semester of 2024.
Support, Scholarships, and Stability
This kind of immersive academic work generally only happens when students feel secure, and Grace expressed that she felt fortunate to have been supported throughout her time at Aquinas.
She shared how cool it was to work with Dr. Durham on this paper, and in her Senior Salute, she thanked him for his close mentorship throughout the years. “I have had at least one class with Dr. Durham every semester,” she elaborates. “That’s what’s great about being at Aquinas. Having small classes, you get to know your professors super well.”
Her academic achievements were also deeply supported by the stability she found through scholarships and family. Grace entered Aquinas with the Spectrum Scholarship, a full-tuition award that immediately removed the financial barriers associated with attending college, freeing her to pursue academic excellence rather than paying off the next tuition bill. She is also the recipient of the Hillary Family Scholarship, which is awarded to “students with demonstrated leadership, ongoing involvement in community service, and who are actively practicing their Catholic faith.”
“What’s funny is that my parents are actually really good friends with the Hillarys,” Grace shared. Her parents had become friends with them on a study abroad trip to Ireland during their time at Aquinas. “I feel like we came full circle. They watched me grow up. I remember going to their house every Christmas. Every year, they’d meet up with their friends from Ireland, and I was always there. Even though we hadn’t seen each other in a few years, and even though none of us realized I’d won their scholarship, they were still supporting me. That’s really cool, and I’m so thankful for that.”
What’s Next for Grace?
Grace's next chapter will see her pursue her passion for immigration and refugee justice. She has received another full tuition scholarship to Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law, a testament to her exceptional potential.
In her Bukowski essay, Grace shared a commitment she made to herself when leaving that first advising meeting with Dr. Durham. She wrote, “The one thing I was sure of, however, was that I wanted to be an alum that Doc mentions to his students, someone who he and the campus could look at with pride.”
Grace’s dedication, intellect, compassion, and unwavering commitment to service have left a lasting impression on the Aquinas College community. She will undoubtedly be someone that “Doc” and our entire AQ community highlight as one of our most outstanding students.