Women College Alumna Part of "Underground Astronauts" Team!

So cool!

In 2013, in a cave known as Rising Star near Johannesburg, South Africa, an international team of scientists began the process of uncovering more than 1,500 well-preserved bones and teeth. The discovery of the fossils, hidden in a barely accessible chamber, adds a new branch to the human family tree: a creature dubbed Homo naledi. Papers detailing the team's findings have just been published, as reported yesterday by National Geographic, the New York Times, and other media.

Alia Gurtov ’07 was one of six women chosen to join the expedition as a result of some unique qualifications. . . . Gurtov earned master’s degrees in archaeology from Leiden University, Netherlands, and in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is now a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology at UW–Madison. After graduating from Wellesley, she spent one year as a Thomas J. Watson Fellow researching the intersection of nationalism and paleoanthropology in Europe, Asia and Africa, and participated in Pleistocene excavations at Neumark-Nord, Germany, and Pinnacle Point, South Africa.

Women's Colleges Rock! And this secret is getting out as more young women are choosing to attend a women's college. Alia Gurtov is glad she did and look at her fantastic career!