Mia McGraw Wins 2026 Tomato Can Loving Cup Award
Monday, May 18, 2026
A dedicated leader known for lifting up her fellow students, Mia McGraw, ’26 BSB, is the winner of the 2026 Tomato Can Loving Cup Award, the most prestigious award the Carlson School of Management bestows on an undergraduate student.
She received this honor as part of the undergraduate commencement ceremony on May 18.
“It feels great. Honestly, I was kind of shocked to get it. I feel like I’ve touched so many avenues of Carlson, and they’ve given me so much,” McGraw said after the ceremony. “It’s meant the world to me that I can give back to the community here.”
McGraw held many leadership roles throughout her time at Carlson, most recently serving as student body president on the Carlson Business Board. She mentored first-year students through the Carlson Crew program, and she worked at Carlson as a teaching assistant and a Carlson Ambassador. A Campbell Centennial Scholar, McGraw graduated with a Human Resources & Industrial Relations major and a Managing People in Organizations minor.
Through it all, she maintained a commitment to building strong relationships and advocating for students.
“I have prioritized giving back in a community that has done so much for me in my college journey because I want every student to feel at home at Carlson,” McGraw wrote in her nomination materials for the Tomato Can Loving Cup Award.
Outside of Carlson, McGraw held numerous student leadership roles at University of Minnesota entities, including the Undergraduate Student Government, Student Senate, and University Senate. She represented the University of Minnesota in Washington, D.C., during her sophomore year, when she lobbied to focus on anti-hazing and student organization legislation. She also interned at Procter & Gamble and Holmes Murphy & Associates.
After graduation, McGraw will return to Procter & Gamble as an HR intern before continuing her Carlson journey in the Master of Human Resources & Industrial Relations program in the fall.
Recipients of the Tomato Can Loving Cup Award are eligible for a master’s degree scholarship from Minnesota Carlson. McGraw will be able to choose from a half-tuition scholarship to obtain an MBA or a master’s in Supply Chain Management or Applied Business Analytics, or a $20,000 scholarship for a master’s in Marketing, Finance, Business Analytics or Accountancy.
The oldest award given to students by Minnesota Carlson, the Tomato Can Loving Cup’s history dates to 1929 when students asked Dean Russell Stevenson to present an outstanding service award to a senior. Henry Hilton, ’29 BSB, volunteered to make the trophy that would be presented to the winner. As a joke, he fashioned a trophy from a tomato soup can nailed to a wooden candlestick that belonged to his mother. To Hilton’s surprise, Stevenson presented him with his own creation, which became known as the Tomato Can Loving Cup Award. The increasingly rickety soup can is given each year.