Scholarships
Philip J. McKenna Memorial Scholarship For a Rising Senior Geology Major at Colorado College
The Philip J. McKenna Memorial Scholarship is given to a Colorado College geology major to support geologic studies in the Rocky Mountain region and to reward excellence in geologic achievement. The recipient is nominated by the faculty at Colorado College. This scholarship was nominated by Colorado College Geology Department faculty. This scholarship was established by Don and Elizabeth McKenna in honor of their father and husband, respectively. Philip McKenna was a geology major at Colorado College, served as President of RMAG in 1984, received the Distinguished Service Award in 1986, became an Honorary Member in 1989, and was named the Outstanding Explorer by RMAG in 1991.
The 2025 Philip J. McKenna Memorial Scholarship was awarded to:
Harold Oppenheim, Junior, Geology, Colorado College
Harold will be studying subglacial sedimentary processes using the Late Proterozoic Tava Sandstone of the Colorado Front Range and iceberg-rafted detritus from Antarctica. An understudied part of the Tava deposits are large sand ridges, of the type that are forming beneath the Antarctic ice sheet today. Harold will investigate the sedimentology and internal structure of Tava sand ridges, to discover what they may reveal about the “Snowball Earth” icesheets that may have covered Colorado at ~ 670 to 690 million years ago. He will use SEM imaging and a new AI software to compare Tava clastic material to definitely subglacial clastics from sediment cores from Antarctica.
Harold’s work will be under the direction of Dr. Christine Siddoway.
Harold has a BA in Geology from Georgetown Day School, Washington DC. He is a Junior at CC and expects to graduate in May, 2026
Sadie Almgren, Junior, Geology, Colorado College
Sadie’s thesis topic is “U–Pb Geochronology and Depositional History of the Dawson Formation: Provenance and Timing of Laramide Uplift.” The Upper Cretaceous–Paleogene Dawson Formation is a sedimentary record of the uplift event. She will work on samples from the basal member that is poorly studied or mapped. This unit consists of coarse clasts and grains derived from shallow intrusive and/or volcanic rocks, and is sharply overlain by white-weathering, coarse, arkosic conglomerate and sandstone, the arkosic member, that was derived from erosion of the Pikes Peak Granite. The goal of her research project is to analyze ash beds and igneous-derived clastic sandstone samples from the Dawson Formation using U-Pb geochronological methods. This approach will provide a more precise date for the timing of uplift and deformation of the Front Range during the Laramide.
Sadie’s work is under the direction of Dr. Paul Myrow.
Sadie is a Junior at Colorado College
Recent winners of the Philip J. McKenna Memorial Scholarship:
2024 Annie Breyak, Colorado College
2023 Mackenzie Boyd and Emma Revenaugh, Colorado College
2022 Spencer Shaw, Colorado College
Nominated by Faculty