We are happy to announce the winners of the Linguistics Opportunity Award for 2026. The annual award provides a scholarship of $1000 to promising UW-Madison Linguistics majors who demonstrate excellence in the study of linguistics and meaningful engagement with language science in the larger community. The award is made possible through generous donations from alumni and other friends and supporters of UW Linguistics over the years. We are so proud of the dedication and achievements of these amazing students!
2026 Linguistics Opportunity Awards
Michelle Drane – Michelle is an aspiring Sociolinguist looking to study and research dialect variations of African American English. Her dream is to reform institutions like public education through linguistic justice in the classroom and curriculum.
Tvisha Rao – Tvisha is an aspiring Computational Linguist. When not analyzing data for various research projects or helping out at the Linguistics Student Organization’s events, she can be found talking about her hopes for the harmonious future of linguistics and Artificial Intelligence to anyone who will listen.
Please consider donating to the Linguistics Department Fund if you would like to help grow our fund and support linguistics at UW!