Logan Turner, a senior in the Louisiana Scholars’ College at Northwestern State University, has received an exciting opportunity.

Before graduation, students in the scholar’s college must prepare a thesis. Turner’s thesis has been selected to be presented at the Southern Regional Honors Conference in Memphis, Tennessee, at the end of March.

Turner chose to write his thesis about minorities such as LGBTQ individuals. He mentioned the theory that minorities face higher levels of stress than people who are not minorities.

Turner’s thesis explores whether there is a link between minorities being stressed and them turning to destructive coping mechanisms.

“An aspect of that is this idea that if you don’t have a good support system or coping mechanisms, it leads to you not being able to deal with stress in a positive way,” Turner said.

In the fall, Turner constructed a survey to send to the psychology department at NSU. His survey received 479 responses, giving him a substantial amount of data to use as support for his thesis.

Turner also had the help of two thesis advisors overlooking his work.

“At his core, Logan Turner is a champion and advocate,” Director of Louisiana Scholars’ College Kirsten Bartels said. “He draws on his passion to motivate himself and to inspire others.”

Dr. Maggio, president of NSU, said that NSU is supportive of the research undergraduates at Louisiana Scholars’ College conduct.

“It’s important for students to be able to share that information,” Maggio said.

Turner is continuing to prepare for his thesis being presented at the upcoming conference.

“It was really cool that mine got accepted. I was really nervous about it,” Turner said.