St. Michael’s College student Ashley Turner of Monkton, is in the awards spotlight once again. Turner, a graduate of Mount Abraham Union High School who recently received the Keleher award at Saint Michael’s, earned the Katherine Fairbanks Memorial Award and finished  her studies as one of five seniors with a perfect 4.0 grade-point average.

Turner is the third in four years to earn the Fairbanks Award, which is given to an outstanding student in the graduating class. The recipient must maintain a high level of academic achievement over four years, and demonstrate commitment to the intellectual, social and moral values of the College by numerous and exemplary contributions to the life of the campus community.

Turner is not only the top academic in the graduating class but has been heavily involved around campus. She has a 4.0 GPA as a Biology major on a pre-medicine track, minoring in both anthropology and chemistry, and was the 2020 NE10 Elite 24 award winner thanks to having the highest GPA among all women’s lacrosse players in the league. The dean’s list student has landed a pair of D2 ADA Academic Achievement Awards while qualifying six times for the NE10 Academic Honor Roll, studying traditional Chinese medicine while traveling abroad during her other semester. Turner has been a member of SAAC and HHH, served on the Saint Michael’s Athletic Hall of Fame Committee, been an Orientation leader and a Pre-Orientation Weekend leader, and worked with Green Up SMC.

A member of four honor societies, Turner was inducted into Beta Beta Beta (Biology), Chi Alpha Sigma (college athlete), Delta Epsilon Sigma (Catholic college) and Phi Beta Kappa (liberal arts). She has also been part of a team on campus studying the brains of Central American Wandering Spiders through a NASA research grant.