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Updated: March 10, 2012 8:06AM

Joseph Muriello, of Oak Park, a senior majoring in voice, and a graduate of Oak Park-River Forest High School, Oak Park, and Jonathan Smith, also of Oak Park and a senior, majoring in music education, a graduate of Timothy Christian High School, Chicago, are members of Illinois Wesleyan’s Collegiate Choir making 10 appearances on its 2012 tour from March 3-20.

The choir’s itinerary will include performances in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio and Illinois.

The Illinois Wesleyan University Collegiate Choir has established a long history of excellence through its on-campus performances, annual tours and recordings. The choir also sponsors the IWU Choral Commission Series, which in its 61-year history has added many significant works to the choral repertoire and resulted in a number of important world premieres at IWU.

The 58-voice choir is composed of student musicians representing the School of Music and other areas of the university, and is dedicated to the performance of the finest sacred and secular choral music of the past five centuries. Students in the choir are selected by audition and maintain a rigorous rehearsal schedule in preparation for their concert tour and other engagements throughout the year.

The Lewis University Mock Trial teams finished 2011 on a strong note. Lewis A team competed in the 16th annual Yale Invitational in Connecticut, while the B team finished solid at the St. Francis Midwest Challenge Invitational in Joliet. Michael Park, of River Forest, is on the Lewis University Mock Trial team.

Facing some of the best teams in the nation, the Lewis team earned 11th place out of 40 teams at Yale. The Lewis A team was placed in the A bracket. They started the competition by winning against Florida University in the first round. Lewis split the win with Harvard University’s A team in the second round. It followed it up by winning against Georgetown University A team. Lewis lost the final match up against Penn State University A team.

Michael Park also earned individual honors for the third consecutive year. He ranked in third place. Only the top five individuals were honored, unlike other competitions that honor the top 10. Otherwise, Kevin Whelehan of Alsip and Martell Khattab of Chicago would have been honored.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison has recognized students named to the dean’s list for the fall semester of the 2011-2012 academic year. Students who achieve at a high level academically are recognized by the dean at the close of each semester. To be eligible for the dean’s list, students must complete a minimum of 12 graded degree credits in that semester. Each university school or college sets its own GPA requirements for students to be eligible to receive the honor.

Local students who have received this honor include: of Oak Park — Erik D. Anderson, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Devin John Burke, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Brian Donald Cannon, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Jennifer Elizabeth Haas, School of Human Ecology, Dean’s High Honors; Pauline Bette Lazzeretti, School of Human Ecology, Dean’s Honor List; Alexander Metz MacMillan, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; David Bryen Meyerson, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Maggie Elizabeth Quinn, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Michael Thomas Satinover, School of Business, Dean’s List; and

of River Forest — John Vincent Casey, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Mallory Charlotte Cybulski, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Alexander Dahmani, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Dean’s List; Teresa Elizabeth Deziel, School of Education, Dean’s List; Paul David Economos, College of Engineering, Dean’s Honor List; Sarah Anne Levinsky, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List; Maeve Lacey Oconnor, School of Education, Dean’s List; and Crescentia Adela Stegner-Freitag, College of Letters and Science, Dean’s List.

Jordan West, of Oak Park, has been named to the dean’s list at The University of Scranton, which recognizes students for academic excellence during the 2011 fall semester. A student must have a grade-point average of 3.5 or better with a minimum number of credit hours to make the dean’s list. The list includes students from the Jesuit university’s College of Arts and Sciences, the Kania School of Management, the Panuska College of Professional Studies and the College of Graduate and Continuing Education. More than 1,420 students were named to fall 2011 semester dean’s list.

West is a freshman modern language — Italian major in Scranton’s College of Arts and Sciences.

Patrick Johnson, of Oak Park, an applied physics and pre-engineering major at Carroll University, was selected for a paid internship with the Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium and NASA, held this summer at the Milwaukee School of Engineering.

Only six students were chosen, with majors in any science, math, technology or engineering discipline, a minimum 2.5 GPA, demonstrated strong interest in the project, self-motivation and the ability to complete work with minimal supervision. Johnson and his classmate Aleysha Kobiske of Waukesha were referred by Damon Resnick, assistant professor of physics.

As part of the Student Satellite Initiative, Johnson and Kobiske joined the high-altitude balloon project, Elijah, which provides opportunities for students to fly their science experiments in a near-space environment. “I was able to broaden my horizons and go into uncharted waters. This internship helped me realize that I will do what I can to become a part of the engineering world,” Johnson said. He is a 2009 graduate of St. Patrick High School in Chicago and son of Frank and Sheila Johnson, of Oak Park.

Johnson and Kobiske were part of a collaborative team of science and engineering specialists, tasked to design and build a science-driven payload that was launched from a high-altitude balloon that had to ascend up to 100,000 feet or more before bursting. They assisted the Elijah Launch Team in the launch of its satellite; tracked and chased the balloon as it traversed, retrieved the payload upon landing and analyzed the resulting data. They presented their results at the annual Wisconsin Space Conference Aug. 18-19.