Minerva Scholarship Sends Longbranch Woman to Advanced Studies Abroad

Longbranch resident Gretchen Schowalter was awarded a $7,000 Minerva Scholarship in July to pursue advanced studies in physics at the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen. Her first year at the Institute will provide an overview of physics areas: quantum computers and quantum communication, astrophysics, particle physics, computational physics, solid state physics, climate and geophysics, and biophysics. This will allow her to narrow her focus and seek research opportunities.

The Minerva Scholarship, established in 1991 in Gig Harbor, provides scholarships to women whose formal education has been interrupted for at least one year and who live or work within the boundaries of the Peninsula School District. Schowalter entered Lewis and Clark College in Portland with a scholarship to study French horn and graduated with a Bachelor of Science in math and physics. She still turns to the French horn or piano for diversion.

Upon graduation, she applied for master’s level programs. Due to lab closures during the COVID-19 pandemic, opportunities for research and funding were limited. A year after graduating, she accepted an internship in Vienna, Austria, while she continued her search for a suitable placement. While in Vienna she learned about the Niels Bohr Institute and took time to visit the campus. Her application was accepted, and funding was offered but then withdrawn, so she returned to the Key Peninsula and worked at The Red Barn Youth Center and at Ravensara Espresso to build up her savings.

Schowalter, born in Wisconsin, is the youngest of four girls. When she was 4, her family moved to Minnesota. When she was 7 years old her family was in an auto accident and her father was killed. During this period of grief, her mother decided to return to medical school. Her residency brought the family to the northwest and to the Key Peninsula.

Schowalter welcomes the opportunity to sharpen her focus. “Right now, particle physics, going deeper into high energy, like working on a collider” is appealing, but so is the study of how glaciers evolve.

“There are just so many existing questions and questions we don’t yet know enough to ask.”