The Undergraduate Scholar Award was established by The Presser Foundation to celebrate undergraduate music students who have achieved a high level of musical and academic excellence, demonstrated leadership and service, and contributed to an inclusive community.
Each year, one student in their final year at hundreds of higher education institutions across the country is chosen as the recipient of the Award. As part of the Award, the student receives $3,000 to use as they wish and carries the honor of being known as a Presser Scholar for the rest of their life.
Wiz Petta received the 2025-26 Undergraduate Scholar Award from Purchase College after earning a degree in Studio Production with a concentration in jazz guitar. In this post, learn more about her experience at Purchase College, her passion for studio production, and how she’s contributed to her community.
Academic Excellence
Wiz Petta plays guitar, electric bass, violin, and sings. She began her studies at SUNY Schenectady in Music Technology, with a Jazz Guitar concentration. She was involved in musical ensembles and helped her teacher recording visiting bands in the studio and working live sound for events. After completing her associate’s degree, Petta transferred to SUNY Purchase’s Studio Production program.
During her time at Purchase, she worked as a live sound engineer and Tech Coordinator at The Student Center, where she mixed and records live student and touring bands. Petta has recorded, mixed, and mastered for students at no cost in order to contribute to the creative community and hone her skills. She also worked with film majors on sound for their short films and assisted with sound set-up and coordination for Purchase’s “Tiny Mic” series. According to her professors, she demonstrated outstanding focus, participation, and effort in classes.
Leadership
Petta served as a teaching assistant (TA) for the live sound professor and as Tech Coordinator at The Stood (a multipurpose social hub), where she mentored students. She handled finances, repairs, employee scheduling, training, payments, and general upkeep of all tech equipment. She also ordered backline needed to produce this year’s Culture Shock event.
As the Tech Services Coordinator in the music department, she set up live sound for students’ recitals and often recorded and mixed them too. This past year, Petta assisted with Purchase’s “Tiny Mic” series with students from the film, theater, and music departments. She handled the live amplification and recording of these weekly events, which are edited and shared to the Tiny Mic YouTube channel.
She always helped friends who needed it, including checking over their four-part harmony homework and offering feedback. In masterclasses, she would offer to show peers how she got certain guitar tones. In her precalculus class, she met with other students out of class to help them understand difficult problems.
Contributing to an inclusive community
Sound engineering students at The Stood are a very diverse group. As a woman in a male-dominated field, Petta has already faced misogyny and ageism, including musicians saying they were “surprised” she did so well mixing their set or being ignored because some are not expecting her to be in charge. As Stood Tech Coordinator, she focuses on teaching other femme-presenting people how to be confident in what they do, how to stop apologizing when not needed, to trust their ears, and to stay calm in times of high stress.
Petta also worked with other queer film, art, and music students on projects that highlight the LGBTQIA experience. She worked on sound for a short film that was featured in the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival, recording dialogue and sound effects on-set, composing an original song for a scene, and helping place a song by another queer Purchase musician in the film.
Wiz Petta’s work at Purchase College reflects a rare combination of technical mastery, creative generosity, and genuine investment in the people around her. We’re so glad to celebrate her as one of this year’s Undergraduate Scholar Award recipients and look forward to seeing where her work takes her next.