2002 Rhodes Scholars Elected
2001 Rhodes Scholars Elected
2000 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1999 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1998 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1997 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1996 Rhodes Scholars Elected
|
District VII - Arizona
|
Keith William Benedict Degree: United States Military Academy: B.S., Economics, 2003 |
|
A second-generation West Pointer, Keith currently serves as the Brigade Command
Sergeant Major at the United States Military Academy, where he is responsible
for the execution of policies and enforcement of standards for all 4,000
cadets. A scholar-athlete with more than 350 skydives to his credit, Keith
serves as the ARMY Skydiving Team operations manager and earned 2nd Place
Overall in the Intermediate Division at the 2001 National Collegiate Skydiving
Championships. Keith rowed for the West Point Crew Team before learning to
skydive, and he enjoys hiking and playing golf. During summer leadership
development training at the Academy, Keith served (in 2001) as a First Sergeant
and (in 2002) as a Regimental Executive Officer. At the Academy, Keith has
received the "Top Gun" Award for mathematics, the Brigadier General Lee Donne
Olvey Award (named for another West Point Rhodes Scholar) for microeconomics,
and has been elected to the Phi Kappa Phi National Scholastic Honor Society.
Before journeying to Oxford, Keith will marry his fiancée, Megan Donohue, a
graduate of Mount Holyoke College. Following a honeymoon in the Caribbean,
Keith will complete U.S. Army Ranger or Airborne School at Fort Benning,
Georgia. At Oxford, Keith plans to study the role of the military in a post-war
environment, focusing on how the armed forces can work together with
non-military organizations to assist with the economic recovery and development
of war-torn nations.
|
|
|
District V - Illinois
|
Chesa Boudin Degree: Yale University: B.A., History, 2003 |
| Elected to Phi Beta Kappa in his junior year, Chesa
Boudin is a History major focusing on American and Latin American contemporary
history, with a special interest in migration and forced displacement issues.
In his first year at Yale, Chesa won an Association of Yale Alumni Community
Service Summer Fellowship to defend immigrants' rights and work on sweatshop
issues. He has traveled widely and spent his junior year studying at the
Universidad de Chile as a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholar. This
year, he won a Mellon Forum grant from Yale to do thesis research on Peruvian
immigrants in Chile. Chesa has participated in a range of community service
projects including protecting nature reserves in rural Guatemala, constructing
houses in Chile, and volunteer interpreting for Spanish-only speakers at
Yale-New Haven hospital. In 2001, Chesa was one of 50 Goldman Sachs Global
Leaders selected worldwide for academic achievement, dedication to service, and
leadership potential. Chesa is an advocate for criminal justice reform and was
a founding member of the Student Legal Action Movement at Yale. He has
campaigned for improved prison conditions and protection of prisoners' rights
in Connecticut State prisons and has lectured and published essays on the
impact of parental incarceration for young children. He has also been an active
member of the Yale Coalition for Peace, advocating a peaceful solution to the
conflict in Iraq and encouraging campus and community debate about the war. At
Yale he works as a study-abroad peer advisor and has a weekly radio show. In
his spare time Chesa enjoys traveling, hiking and running.
|
|
|
District V - Illinois |
Sean Geren Campbell Degree: University of Chicago: B.A., History, 2002 |
| A native of New York City and a 2002 graduate of the University
of Chicago, Sean currently lives in Brooklyn where he works for the New York
City Economic Development Corporation, administering programs to retain
industrial companies in New York and working on special projects. His
undergraduate thesis at the University of Chicago, on the early history of the
World Bank, won the Barnard Prize for the best B.A. thesis in American History.
Sean was named a Truman Scholar in 2001, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and was
appointed to the position of Student Marshall of the University of Chicago (the
highest academic honor for undergraduates at the University). Urban policy is
one of Sean’s long-standing interests—he has worked in the Mayor’s Office in
Chicago and for StreetWise, a Chicago
newspaper that’s distributed by homeless people—and he hopes to continue to
work on urban issues: "I want to make American cities better places for the
people who live in them, particularly their poorest residents." In his academic
career, Sean has focused on modern international history, particularly the
history of colonialism and of post-colonial attempts to spur economic
development in non-western countries. Sean enjoys "listening to and making
music, trying to perfect my cooking skills, reading, and watching sports (go
Mets!)." He also enjoys skiing, backpacking—"one of my ambitions is to
through-hike the Appalachian Trail"—and other outdoor sports and played on
several intramural teams at the University of Chicago. Sean look forward to
traveling extensively while at Oxford and hopes especially to go to Mongolia.
|
|
|
District VI - Kansas |
Robert Michael Chamberlain
Degree: University of Kansas: B.A., Political Science, 2002 |
| A 2001 Truman Scholar, Robert Chamberlain has
sustained an interest in public policy for many years. In 1999, he was the only
freshman to receive an Undergraduate Research Award, which allowed him to spend
the summer researching National Missile Defense policy. As a senior, his Honors
thesis laid the theoretical groundwork for his research at Oxford, and he put
his newly minted methodological training to good use in a paper, co-authored
with one of his professors, on policy diffusion. Robert graduated Phi Beta
Kappa with University and Departmental Honors in May 2002. As a Field Artillery
officer, Robert has “the good fortune to be included among those children of
Saint Barbara who are known collectively as the King of Battle.” Robert became
a Redleg by way of the University of Kansas Army ROTC, where he had the
opportunity to serve as the Cadet Command Sergeant Major and the Cadet
Battalion Commander. Additionally, Robert attended Airborne school, where he
“jumped out of airplanes, and had a three-week internship with the Office of
the Chief of Public Affairs, Information Strategies Division at the Pentagon,”
where he published stories for the Army News Service. Robert enjoys spending
his time with his “lovely and vivacious” wife, Kristen, and their
“hyper-kinetic” Cairn Terrier, Achilles. Together they watch “mindless
big-budget movies and teen comedies….All that I ever needed to know about life
I learned from Sean Connery in The Rock.”
Prior to making his way to Oxford, Robert will be assigned to the 1-320FA, a
Direct Support battalion of the 101st Airborne Division.
|
|
|
District VI - Kansas
|
Benjamin L. Champion
Degree: Kansas State University: B.A., Chemistry, Environmental Science, 2002 |
| Ben Champion is an accomplished chemist and a
dedicated environmentalist, but prefers to view himself as a political
scientist. At Kansas State University he has distinguished himself as a Howard
Hughes Medical Institute Undergraduate Research Scholar, elucidating the
potential structures and energies of C4Li and C4Na monoanionic clusters through computational
theoretical chemistry. He has also grown ferroelastic crystals and studied
their domain-switching mechanisms using fast video. Ben’s interest in nature is
also evident in his work on environmental change on campus and in the
Manhattan, Kansas, community. As co-founder, former president, and former
treasurer of K-State’s Students for Environmental Action, he has led the
group’s efforts to increase recycling and responsible energy use at K-State for
three years. Ben is a Udall Scholar (2000) and a KSU Putnam Scholar, was
elected to Phi Beta Kappa, is an Eagle Scout, has interned for Congressman
Dennis Moore, and has served on the Mayor’s Recycling Task Force in Manhattan,
Kansas. Ben has a deep love of nature and humanity and seeks “ways in which
humanity can perpetuate a sustainable existence within a natural context.” At
Oxford he plans to research applications of materials chemistry to solar and
fuel cells. After Oxford, he plans to work with a governmental agency, national
lab, or non-profit organization with an eye to “bridging the widening gap
between scientific and policy circles in the areas of energy and environmental
policy.” Ben enjoys running, camping, and playing drums in his band, The
Vetivers. |
|
| District VII - Arizona
|
Peter Anthony Chiarelli
Degree: Pomona College: B.A., Chemistry, 2003 |
| Peter Chiarelli has worked at Los Alamos National
Laboratory throughout college, conducting nanophotonics research. He has
investigated nanoscale surface dynamics—the ability to manipulate molecules,
twist them, and direct them in specified ways—which has application in areas
ranging from the chemistry of living cells to the construction of
microelectronics. First published at age 19, his work has been featured in Langmuir, Advanced Materials,
and the Journal of Physical Chemistry, as well as in a U.S. Department of Energy press
release. Peter has a patent pending for a novel method of molecular
self-assembly pioneered at Los Alamos. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, NSCS, and
Sigma Xi, Peter was also named a Goldwater Scholar in his sophomore year. He
has received Pomona’s ACS award in organic chemistry and the college’s Tileston
prize in physics. He has worked both as a general chemistry teaching assistant
and as a liaison to the chemistry department, promoting contact between
students and faculty. Peter’s interest in chemistry extends to a comparable
passion for medicine. He volunteered in the emergency room at Pomona Valley Hospital,
worked as a caretaker and a patient advocate for the hospital, and has served
as a Spanish translator. Over the years, Peter has been very active in both
music and theater, with roles ranging from Gilbert and Sullivan operetta to Hamlet. He has participated both in
choir and in an a cappella group, and has played classical piano for fifteen years. Peter enjoys playing soccer,
lifting weights, and snowboarding. At Oxford, he plans to study magnetic
resonance imaging of the brain. |
|
| District VII - Louisiana
|
Dave Ashok Chokshi
Degree: Duke University: B.A., Chemistry, Public Policy, 2003 |
| An Angier B. Duke Scholar and Faculty Scholar at Duke
University, Dave Chokshi was elected to Phi Beta Kappa as a junior and has
earned both a Truman Scholarship and a Goldwater Scholarship. He has
participated in four research projects on chemokine receptor CX3CR1, serving as
both a Howard Hughes Research Fellow and a Molecular Immunology Research
Assistant at the Department of Immunology at the Duke Medical Center. He
conducted additional research as a Sackler Institute Summer Research Fellow at
the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the New York University School of
Medicine. Dave worked with the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals to
help develop Healthy People 2010, a plan to establish quantitative and
qualitative state public health objectives, and examined the self-reported
health status of diabetes patients as a Policy Analysis Research Assistant at
the Sanford Institute of Public Policy Studies. Dave tutored local children,
volunteered at health clinics across North Carolina, and developed and
implemented a health, safety, and HIV-education program for children in Mumbai,
India. In addition to publishing and presenting his academic research, Dave is
Editor-in-Chief of Vertices, the Duke journal of science and technology, and is
Associate Biosciences Editor of the Journal of Young Investigators. Dave
describes himself as a “huge basketball fanatic, particularly when it comes to
Duke basketball” and looks forward to playing basketball at Oxford, since he
“never had a chance at Duke.” Dave also enjoys weight training, classical
Indian dance (Rass), croquet, and reading Jain philosophy.
|
|
| District IV - Tennessee
|
Adam Steven Cureton
Degree: University of Georgia: B.A., Political Theory, Evolutionary Theory; M.A., Philosophy, 2003 |
| A University of Georgia Foundation Fellow, an
Institute for Humane Studies Fellow, and a U.S. Presidential Scholar, Adam
Cureton won several university philosophy prizes, including prizes for the best
paper in ethics and best paper overall. He has published and presented numerous
articles and is a charter member and vice-president of Leadership, Education,
and Advocacy for Disabilities, an organization of disabled students aimed at
raising awareness about disabilities. Adam created a mentoring program that
matches disabled college students with disabled students in the community. He
also conceived and taught an Honors class entitled “The Undergraduate Research
Forum,” which seeks to create a community of undergraduate researchers and
scholars. In addition to his studies at the University of Georgia, Adam studied
at the London School of Economics and at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
He has distinguished himself in racquetball and enjoys rock climbing and
kayaking. As a professor of philosophy, Adam aspires to “teaching the
importance of open-mindedness and promoting social justice as a practical
ideal.”
|
|
| District VII - Utah
|
Gretchen Jane Domek
Degree: University of Utah: B.S., Biological Chemistry, 2003 |
| A Minnesota native, Gretchen Domek came to Utah as a
Presidential Scholar and has received numerous awards for her work in
chemistry, including the 2002 American Chemical Society Award in Analytical
Chemistry. Her undergraduate research and Honors Thesis involve the
thermodynamics of serine protease inhibitor interactions. Gretchen is also
active outside of the laboratory and has skied in the US National Cross-Country
Championships three times, including the 2002 Olympic Trials. As a two-time
Varsity letter winner, she also skied for the nationally acclaimed University
of Utah ski team. This past summer, Gretchen lived in Guayaquil, Ecuador, where
she studied the Ecuadorian health care system and volunteered at two medical
clinics. Gretchen has also volunteered extensively at the Catholic Newman
Center at the University of Utah, where she lived and worked for three years. (“Yes,”
she says, “there are Catholics in Utah!”) Gretchen has served as an assistant
coach and state evaluator for the Utah Future Problem Solving Program and has
actively promoted this extracurricular activity for junior high and high school
students. Gretchen is an avid runner and recently ran her first marathon. She
also enjoys playing tennis, biking, hiking, and practicing the violin and
piano. More than anything, she “loves a good challenge and adventure.” Gretchen
has been “rock climbing in Utah, hiking in the Andes, scuba diving in the
Caribbean, surfing off the coast of Ecuador, and ski racing all across North
America.” Gretchen aspires to be a “virus detective” combating infectious
disease.
|
|
| District I - New Hampshire
|
Jeremy Lenn England
Degree: Harvard University: A.B., Biochemical Sciences, 2003 |
| Jeremy England has been “drawn to the physical
sciences” for as long as he can remember and first took advantage of Harvard’s
graduate-level offerings in chemistry and physics at the age of eighteen. Since
high school, biology has held his fascination as well, and his undergraduate
research has ranged from the molecular cell biology of membrane traffic to the
theory and simulation of macromolecular design—most recently he contributed to
an improved understanding of the statistical mechanics of protein
designability. He is co-author of a peer-reviewed article in Protein Science (as well as three recent
submissions to Nature and Physical Review Letters) and his work in
science has won him awards from Harvard College, Pfizer Inc., the Research
Science Institute, the Department of Defense, and the Goldwater Foundation.
Jeremy’s academic coursework, which earned him election to Phi Beta Kappa in
his junior year, has extended beyond the natural sciences into the realms of
political and analytical philosophy as well as economics and international
relations theory. He was a writer for the Harvard Science Review, has been active as a parliamentary debater, served as a
peer-tutor in physics and chemistry, and was a sciences enrichment mentor for
young students. A violinist since age seven, Jeremy relaxes by playing chamber
music, but also enjoys “squash, ultimate frisbee, and acting.”
|
|
| District III - Kentucky
|
Brian Finucane
Degree: Cornell University: B.A., Anthropology, Archaeology, 2003 |
| As an archaeology and anthropology student at Cornell
University, Brian Finucane focused on the study of human remains from
archaeological contexts. His explorations have taken him into the depths of
Etruscan tombs and tunnels in Italy, to Inca ruins high in the Andes, and into
the cupboards of Cornell University, in search of the bones that provide
insights into the lives of ancient people. Brian’s research has been funded by
the classics and archaeology programs at Cornell University and his
collaboration with National Geographic
was featured on the “Mummy Road Show.” He is “presently making the rounds of
the mummy lecture circuit.” When Brian is not in the field or the library, he
serves as a volunteer firefighter, responding to structure fires, motor vehicle
accidents, medical emergencies, and technical rescues. “In addition to helping
people in Ithaca, I enjoy the benefits of having a fire pole outside my door and
smelling of smoke much of the time.” Brian has also worked extensively as a
horseman—on his family’s farm in the Appalachian foothills of Kentucky, at
racetracks, at an equine hospital in the bluegrass and on a stud farm in
Britain. For three years, Brian volunteered as a radio disc jockey in Kentucky,
West Virginia, and Connecticut, playing rockabilly, punk and garage rock. His
other extracurricular interests include “mountaineering, spelunking,
herpetology, paleontology and rowing.” After Oxford, Brian plans to continue
his study of ancient DNA from humans and animals in order to elucidate
population movements and paleopathology.
|
|
| District IV - Florida
|
Tyler Matthew Fisher
Degree: University of Central Florida: B.A., English Literature, 2002; B.A., Spanish, 2003 |
| Tyler Fisher graduated summa cum laude
with a B.A. in English from the University of
Central Florida in 2002 and is currently completing a second B.A. in Spanish.
Tyler is the first student in the history of his university to be named a Rhodes
Scholar. An avid writer, Tyler has had more than twenty poems and essays
published in various anthologies and journals, including The Formalist and
Philological Papers. Tyler has extended his interest in creative writing to teaching
weekly writing classes at an assisted living center (where he also provides
entertainment on the piano), 56-stringed hammered dulcimer, and bowed psaltery
(instruments with which he has produced three musical albums). Since his
freshman year, Tyler has volunteered through UCF’s Honors Elementary Reach Out
(HERO) program where he teaches after-school classes in reading and art. His
students will not soon forget the lesson on Michelangelo’s painting of the
Sistine Chapel, “for which I had the students lie on their backs and paint
paper attached to the underside of their desks.” In addition to his literary
and musical endeavors, Tyler has been recognized by the USDA for his work in
developing a durable paper from the non-indigenous pondweed Hydrilla verticillata. He authored a multilingual
manual on tropical agriculture, Useful Tropical Plants and Their Climatic Zones, for the Educational Concerns for
Hunger Organization. Tyler’s interest in languages has taken him to France and
Spain, where he enjoyed studying chamber music in Normandy and researching
Cuban poetry in Spain’s National Library for his thesis translation of José
Martí’s Ismaelillo.
|
|
| District III - Virginia
|
Jacob Gates Foster
Degree: Duke University: B.S., Physics, 2003 |
| After receiving a Dean’s Summer Fellowship to study
general relativity at Oxford’s Mathematical Institute the summer of his junior
year, Jacob Foster vowed to return and pursue his postgraduate education there.
An Angier B. Duke Scholar at Duke University, Jacob was selected as a Faculty
Scholar in 2002. He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Pi Sigma in his
senior and junior years respectively. In addition to his chosen field of
theoretical physics, he has pursued experimental research in quantum optics,
developing both devices and measurement techniques, and has conducted a
numerical investigation of signal transmission in a spatio-temporally chaotic
system. His “true passion (at the moment) is quantum gravity,” and at Oxford he
intends to study twistor theory with Professor Sir Roger Penrose. An avid linguist,
Jacob is also interested in the evolution of human languages and plans to
continue his work as a Latinist and Hellenist at Oxford. In his free time, he
indulges his love for reading and music, and is hoping “always to have access
to piano (easy) and organ (not so easy).” Jacob is president of Duke’s musical
theater organization, Hoof ‘n’ Horn, and looks forward to participating in the
Oxford drama scene as well. He also longs “to finally make the move from high
baritone to tenor.” Jacob remarks: “If I can tear myself away from the realm of
Platonic beauty, I hope to complete my project to become the perfect
anachronism by mastering fencing and ballroom dance (not to mention falconry).”
|
|
| District III - North Carolina
|
Melanie Somjen Frazer
Degree: Cornell University: B.A., College Scholar, 2003 |
| Somjen Frazer is originally from North Carolina
and recently received her B.A. with honors in the College Scholar program at
Cornell University, where she was also elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Somjen was
named a Presidential Research Scholar (1999-2003), received a Bartels Action
Research Fellowship (2001-02) and, in 2001, was a John Kenneth Galbraith
Scholar in Inequality and Social Policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School
of Government, a fellowship for undergraduate students engaged in pursuing
careers dealing with inequality and social policy. While at Cornell, she worked
on several community-based, participatory research projects on health and
social justice issues and co-authored eight academic papers. Additionally,
Somjen served on several departmental committees and has been an active member
of many social change organizations dealing with issues of race, gender, and
sexuality while at Cornell and describes herself as “a feminist and anti-racist
activist.” Her honors thesis addressed AIDS activism and care-giving in the
1980s in San Francisco and New York City, particularly the ways in which
“lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, sex worker, and sex radical
identities inflected the social movements in each city.” At Oxford, she hopes
to continue this study with a focus on sociology of politics and intends to
continue her involvement in activism, the arts, and outdoor activities. She
hopes eventually to become a professor of sociology and to continue to do
qualitative and quantitative participatory research that benefits historically
marginalized groups. She is currently working as a research associate at
Cornell, evaluating community-university partnerships.
|
|
| District VIII - Washington
|
Kamyar Cyrus Habib
Degree: Columbia University: B.A., English and Comparative Literature, 2003 |
| Literature has always been a passion for Cyrus Habib.
As a young child, he would spend “many insomniac nights racing through
everything from serial mysteries to Russian classics.” While majoring in
English and Comparative Literature at Columbia, he focused on Modernist and
Post-Modernist writers, devoting his time to works by Joyce, Faulkner, Kafka,
Nabokov, Kundera and Rushdie, and developed an interest in the intersections of
literary and critical theory with twentieth century continental philosophy. Studying
under such theorists as Jacques Derrida and Edward Said, Cyrus had the
opportunity “to experience the tremendous possibilities that critical thinking
and close reading can offer.” His own literary interests lie in “the role of
the senses, especially visuality, in the formation of subjectivity.” Cyrus’s
love of literature is matched only by his passion for political activism at
every level. As an undergraduate, he worked with Senators Maria Cantwell and
Hillary Rodham Clinton and served on the executive board of the Columbia
College Democrats and a number of other campus organizations and student
governing boards. A Truman Scholar, Cyrus has served as an advocate for
students with disabilities on Columbia’s campus, while “urging all people with
disabilities to challenge societal limits on their dreams and capabilities.”
Cyrus is a published photographer who believes “whole-heartedly in the
revolutionary possibilities of art, most importantly in its ability to catalyze
social change.”
|
|
| District IV - Arkansas
|
John Arthur Henderson
Degree: Emory University: B.A./M.A., Political Science, 2003 |
| Elected to Phi Beta Kappa as a junior, John Henderson
has served as an intern in the Americas Program at the Carter Center. He
co-founded and organized “The Language of War,” a panel discussion series
addressing Arab and Arab-American culture and politics, the Arab-Israeli
conflict, the U.S. war against terrorism, and other international political
concerns. A member of the Emory Honors Council, John was also active in the Pi
Sigma Alpha political science honor society. John’s community involvement
includes publicity work for the Alaska Coalition of Georgia, a regional
organization seeking the protection of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge and
serving as treasurer at Empty the Shelters, a local initiative to reduce
homelessness in Atlanta. John also co-founded and chaired the coalition
committee for the Heritage Forest Campaign, which advocates enactment of a
road-less policy in the 60 million acres of publicly owned forest land. Film
and music are among John’s passions. He enjoys playing the guitar for the folk/
acoustic/rock band “the whelks” and produced and directed the independent film
short of “viva la revolucion!”.
|
|
| District VIII - Washington
|
Anthony Paul House
Degree: Georgetown University: A.B., History, 2002 |
| Anthony Paul House entered Georgetown University as a
business student and graduated three years later with a degree in History.
Elected to Phi Beta Kappa, he also earned top honors from the History
department—the Morris Historical Medal for best undergraduate thesis (“A
Problematic Solution: Responses to the Marriage Reform Act of 1753”) and the
Foley Award for rigorous historical scholarship and social concern. At
Georgetown, Anthony served as a residence hall assistant and a teacher’s assistant
in the Psychology department. He also sat on the undergraduate admissions
committee and organized the university’s largest weekly Catholic mass. During
his final year, Anthony helped lead a campaign that resulted in the creation of
an administrative position dedicated to addressing the needs of lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender students—a first for any Catholic educational
institution. Anthony is currently a member of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps,
working full-time at a medical clinic for the homeless in downtown Portland,
Oregon, where he helps patients find food, shelter, and clothing. He lives in
community with five other volunteers, sharing the small pleasures of a simple
lifestyle and a monthly food budget of $360. At Oxford, Anthony looks forward
to resuming the exploration of “those seemingly boring but intensely engaging
nooks and crannies of early modern history.”
|
|
| District II - Pennsylvania
|
Matthew Joseph Landreman
Degree: Swarthmore College: B.A., Physics, 2003 |
| A 2000 Goldwater Scholar, Matt Landremann has
conducted plasma physics research at Swarthmore College for the past three
years. He has been a lead- or co-author on several papers based on this work,
and he won the American Physical Society’s Division of Plasma Physics award for
the best undergraduate poster at the 2002 annual meeting. He has also performed
research in computation neuroscience at the Santa Fe Institute and in granular
materials physics at the University of Minnesota. Additionally, Matt is
interested in education—he has taught with the Minnesota Institute for Talented
Youth and coordinated a physics class for Upward Bound, an enrichment program
for African-American high-school students. During college, Matt took two semesters
off, one for an independent study in moral epistemology and the other to study
mathematics in Budapest. Outside of the classroom, Matt enjoys cycling, hiking,
and running, and recently completed his first marathon. Matt founded Food for
Thought, a Swarthmore student group that bakes and sells bread, donating the
proceeds to local charities. In 2001, Matt was awarded Swarthmore’s Sarah
Kaighn Cooper Scholarship, an award given by the faculty to a junior based upon
scholarship, character, and influence at the college. “Elated by the fact that
a person in our society can get paid to learn,” Matt hopes to teach physics and
to engage outreach and diversity issues within the field.
|
|
| District II - New York
|
Jonah Lehrer
Degree: Columbia University: B.A., Neuroscience, English, 2003 |
| Jonah Lehrer’s academic interests and achievements
combine scientific and literary subjects. Jonah explored the neural substrate
of memory with Dr. Eric Kandel and served as Editor-in-Chief of The Columbia Review, the university’s
poetry magazine. He was also a staff writer for the Columbia Spectator. He
received Columbia’s Dean Hawke Memorial Prize in the Humanities for work done
in the Core Curriculum. John founded the Habitat for Humanity High School
Initiative and volunteered for the Columbia Advocacy for the Homeless
Coalition. John has also enjoyed working as a line cook at Le Cirque 2000 and
Le Bernardin and being a Gospel music disc-jockey for Columbia’s Radio Station.
|
|
| District VIII - California
|
Ankur Luthra
Degree: University of California, Berkeley: B.S., Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, 2003; B.S., Business Administration, 2003 |
| Ankur Luthra is a Goldwater Scholar and Regents’
Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, where he maintained a 4.00
GPA. Elected to Phi Beta Kappa as a junior, Ankur has also won thirteen merit
scholarships and is a member of MENSA. In 1999, Ankur started his first company
(YourMP3Guide.com) and is the president and founder of the non-profit
organization Computer Literacy 4 Kids (CL4K), which provides computers,
software, and training and which has assisted underprivileged youth in the
California Bay Area and in India. Ankur is also Editor-in-Chief of the Berkeley EECS Research Journal and
created its on-line feature which helps undergraduates find professors to
support their research. He conducts research in artificial intelligence (complex motor learning, in particular) and
in graph theory, applying game theoretic models to Internet traffic. He has
also researched the business of non-profits for the Haas School of Business at
Berkeley. Ankur has worked for Microsoft as a summer program manager and at
Goldman Sachs as a summer financial analyst. He is “an avid sports fan” who
loves to attend sporting events. Ankur also plays sports, including tennis and
football, and collect sports memorabilia which he funds through “eBay
arbitrage.” A fan of Hindi and English film and the Punjabi dance bhangra, Ankur hopes “to see Europe,
attend the ballroom dance competition at Blackpool, and bring back some grass
from Wimbledon for the memorabilia collection.”
|
|
| District II - New York
|
Sue Meng
Degree: Harvard University: A.B., History and Literature, 2003 |
| Sue Meng attended Harvard on a John Harvard
Scholarship and has also been named a Beinecke Scholar (2002) and an IIE Gilman
Scholar (2001). As an editorial columnist at The Harvard Crimson, Sue wrote a bi-weekly column entitled
“Humanities” and was the co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Historia, a journal for history and literature. She traveled
independently around South China as a researcher-writer for Let’s Go China and worked as a reporter
for Forbes magazine, where she became the youngest reporter to receive an independent byline for an article in the
Forbes 400 issue. She is also the youngest contributor to be published in The
Harvard Review (for an essay on a trip to Siberia—to the camp where her
mother worked during the Cultural Revolution). Sue’s work extends beyond print
into documentary television. She worked on two prime-time ABC News
documentaries, one on the city of Boston (in which she profiled the principal
of a vocational high school in Roxbury) and a second, through the Law and
Justice Unit at ABC, which commemorated the anniversary of September 11th. Sue
studied abroad at Cambridge in spring of her junior year and was recognized for
her work on George Eliot (the focus of her thesis). As a writer, Sue aspires
“to give language to hidden lives, in ways that enrich and inspire my readers’
understanding of the world and my own.” In addition to literature, Sue’s
interests include “old movies, organic farming, and budget travel—I trekked
through Tibet last summer and had a Kodak moment with a real live yak!”
|
|
| District III - Maryland/DC
|
Marianna B. Ofosu
Degree: Howard University: B.A., Classical Civilizations, 2003 |
| Marianna entered Howard University as a 1999 National
Achievement Scholar and a Laureate Scholar and was named a 2001 Institute for
International Education/Goldman Sachs Global Leader and a 2002 Beinecke
Scholar. Marianna is interested in the theory and practice of democracy,
ancient and modern, and is also working at the Harvard University Center for
Hellenic Studies on a political art electronic database. As a Lucy Moten
Fellow, Marianna participated in an archaeological dig on a 3000 year old site
in the Mediterranean Sea. As a 2001 Luard Scholar, she spent her junior year at
Christ Church, Oxford, studying politics in the ancient world. She has also
done research on colonialism, dependency and genocide at the Embassy of Rwanda
in Washington and has worked at the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center to prevent and
eliminate child labor in the cocoa industry in Coté D’Ivore. Marianna helped
establish the first library and civic center at a Liberian refugee camp in
Ghana and helped coordinate an educational support scheme at a school for deaf
children in Scarborough, Tobago. She has also taught high school students in a
national enrichment program at the Ralph J. Bunche International Affairs
Center. At Howard, Marianna has served as the president of Eta Sigma Phi, the
vice-chairwoman of the National Political Congress of Black Women, and the
President of the College of Arts and Sciences Honors Program. Outside of the
classroom, Marianna has coordinated a cheerleading and dance-sport program at
three underprivileged junior and senior high schools and is a collegiate Latin
American dance champion.
|
|
| District I - Rhode Island
|
Sasha Polakow-Suransky
Degree: Brown University: A.B., History, Urban Studies, 2001 |
| Sasha Polakow-Suransky graduated magna cum laude
from Brown University in 2001 with a degree in
Urban Studies and History. His senior thesis chronicled the history of juvenile
incarceration in Rhode Island, focusing on media coverage of juvenile crime and
its influence on the making of public policy. He served as a managing editor of
Brown’s weekly newspaper, the College Hill Independent, worked as a writing tutor for fellow students, and
authored a study on the impact of “zero-tolerance” expulsion laws on
educational opportunity in the Michigan public schools. Since graduation, he
has interned at the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division,
conducted extensive research on the rewriting of history textbooks in post-apartheid
South Africa, and worked as a writing fellow at the American Prospect magazine in Washington, DC.
His American Prospect articles include a dispatch from the 2001 U.N. World Conference Against Racism, a profile of the
families of undocumented workers killed in the World Trade Center attack, and
an investigation of the backlash against Muslim immigrants in Denmark and the
Netherlands. In addition, Sasha has written for the Chronicle of Higher Education
and the Brown Alumni Magazine, and has presented two academic papers at
annual meetings of the American Educational Research Association. He speaks
fluent French and Danish and hopes to pursue a career in international
journalism.
|
|
| District V - Ohio
|
Andrew Charnes Serazin
Degree: Notre Dame University: B.S., Biology, 2003 |
| Andrew Serazin is a Biology major with a concentration
in science, technology, and values. He hails from a “diverse, blue-collar town,
Elyria, twenty miles west of Cleveland, Ohio.” For the past two years, he has
been working on a malaria mosquito genomics projects under the guidance of
Professor Nora Besansky, work which has earned him a Goldwater Scholarship and
two National Science Foundation REU fellowships. The results of this project
were published as part of the Anopheles gambiae Genome Issue of Science
magazine; as co-lead author of that paper, Andrew became the youngest author in
the history of that journal. Andrew’s passion for malaria research extends
beyond the confines of the laboratory into field work, taking him to Burkina
Faso, West Africa, as part of an NIH grant to collect mosquitoes and
collaborate with African scientists in December 2001. Andrew returned to Africa
in August 2002, this time as a health and science delegate at the 2002 United
Nations World Summit in Johannesburg. Andrew hopes “to bridge the gaps between
scientists and society” in order to address more completely world health
problems. Andrew loves basketball and was co-president of his college dorm.
Before his “jaunt into the world of malaria,” Andrew designed web sites for six
different non-profit agencies.
|
|
| District VIII - Nevada
|
Laura Shackelton
Degree: Princeton University: B.A., Molecular Biology, 2003 |
| Laura Shackelton is majoring in Biology and is a
certificate student at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and
International Affairs. She is currently a member of Dr. Lynn Enquist’s lab,
where she is conducting her thesis research on neurotropic viruses. Her
research has focused on an uncharacterized viral gene that is highly-conserved
in a family of these viruses. For her senior independent work in the Woodrow
Wilson School, she has studied emerging zoonotic diseases. Laura is a two-time
recipient of the university’s President’s Award for academic excellence. She is
a captain of Princeton’s cross-country team and a member of the track team; she
currently holds the school steeplechase record. She enjoys writing articles on
diverse scientific topics including astronomy, psychology, and functional
genomics. She loves running, biking, cross-country skiing, hiking, swimming,
and wakeboarding (with her brothers Chris, Jeff and David and sister Kaitlyn)
in the Sierra Nevada mountains. At Oxford, Laura will focus her research
efforts on viral evolution. After Oxford, Laura plans to enroll in a molecular
biology Ph.D. program and hopes to pursue a career combining research, writing,
and teaching.
|
|
| District VI - Minnesota
|
David Aaron Simon
Degree: University of Minnesota: B.A., Political Science, Russian, Global Studies, 2003 |
| David Simon is majoring in Political Science, Russian,
Global Studies and has focused his studies on U.S.-Russian relations and
international relations theory. As the founder and president of the campus
Russian club and of parliamentary debate societies in Minneapolis and Voronezh,
Russia, he organized debates on topics ranging from U.S. missile defense to the
marginalization of men in Russian society. David has authored two
articles—“Russia’s Heartland, Forecast is Hazy” and “Towards a Limited National
Missile Defense”—for the New York Times.
He also volunteered in a project to grant political asylum to Chinese refugees,
worked as a speechwriter for a Member of Parliament in the British House of
Commons, and has co-authored a book on missile defense and articles on defense
spending, Chinese military modernization, and homeland security at the Council
on Foreign Relations. In Moscow, David researched the potential long-term
responses of the Russian government to the abrogation of the 1972
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty for the Bureau Chief of the New York Times
and helped families adopt Russian orphans as an interpreter
and researcher for Kidsave International. This past spring, David returned to
Moscow to found the Council on Civil Cooperation in Russia. At Oxford, he will
explore the intersection of U.S., Russian, and Chinese interests in Central
Asia and outer space. David was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in 2001 and was
awarded a Truman Scholarship in 2002. After Oxford, he plans to return to the
United States to attend law school. David enjoys “frisbee, musical theater, and
rock climbing with my brother.”
|
|
| District IV - Florida
|
Devi Sridhar
Degree: University of Miami: B.S., Biology, Pre-Medical, 2003 |
| A lifelong resident of Miami, Devi Sridhar is in the
Medical Honors Program at the University of Miami (which offers early admission
to medical school) and will graduate in May 2003 at the age of 18. Devi plans
to “change direction from pure medicine to international health policy” and
aspires to a career in government service. Fluent in five languages, she is
also an accomplished solo violinist and lover of the theater—she has played in
pit orchestras for shows such as Bye Bye Birdie, Cabaret, and
Anything Goes. A ranked tennis player, she was captain of her high school varsity tennis team
which won two state championships as well as three regional titles. She has
also written a children’s book on Indian myths, Puzzle Your Way Through Indian Mythology,
to teach Indian culture to young children using interactive games
and puzzles. Devi is currently at work on a book of short stories exploring the
confusion of growing up in two cultures. For the past seven years, she has
tutored autistic children on a weekly basis and has coached them in tennis.
During the summer of 1998, she started a multi-school organization to raise
awareness of autism and increase direct peer involvement in service. “My role
model and inspiration is my late father,” a noted lung cancer physician and
researcher. Devi says, “My family has given me everything I have.” She is
excited “to travel around Europe for the first time, to finally become
‘cultured,’ and to experience Wimbledon strawberries and cream.”
|
|
| District I - Connecticut
|
Prateek Tandon
Degree: Yale University: B.A., African Studies, Economics, 2003 |
| Prateek Tandon’s studies at Yale have focused on
theoretical and policy-related issues of development. He has received numerous
academic awards, including being a two-time recipient of both the Leitner
International Political Economy Fellowship and the Tristan Perlroth Prize for
Foreign Travel. He has also been awarded the Robert E. Bates Summer Traveling
Fellowship, the Richter Summer Traveling Fellowship, the Sunrise Foundation
Research and Travel Grant, and the Aspin International Public Service
Fellowship. For the past two years, Prateek has worked closely with Indian
physicians and students to bring medical relief to village communities in Jammu
and Kashmir, India. Additionally, Prateek has been a health and hygiene
educator for refugee children in Somalia and an intern with a non-governmental
organization in Tanzania. Back at Yale, he also plays on the varsity tennis
team. In addition to his work in development studies at Oxford, Prateek looks
forward to “extensive travel opportunities and the chance to sample some of
London’s acclaimed Indian food.”
|
|
| District V - Indiana
|
Kathleen Diem-Anh Tran
Degree: Indiana University: B.S., Biology, Biochemistry; B.A., Music, 2003 |
| A 2002 Phi Beta Kappa inductee, Kathleen Tran was a
2001 Internal Wells Scholar at Indiana University and a 1999 National Merit and
Eli Lilly Endowment Scholar. In high school, Kathleen received an Indiana
Institute of Microbiology Award for her work in biological sciences. She has
conducted research in molecular pharmacology (funded by the National Institutes
of Health) and is most interested in exploring the interplay between members of
the p53 family of tumor suppressors. Kathleen is an accomplished pianist who
has studied performance under distinguished pianist Luba Edlina for ten years
and has performed more than sixty times in solo and chamber settings. She has
worked as a hospital volunteer, has won several awards in taekwondo,
and has been an active spokesperson for Indiana’s
Vietnamese Student Association. Her writing has earned her awards from the
National Foundation for Advancement of the Arts and from Brown, Purdue, and
Indiana Universities. She has published in several literary journals and was
the youngest-ever contributor to Meridian,
the University of Virginia literary magazine. As an undergraduate she has also
served as educational video host for the Indiana Career Education Network and
has “a tendency to flit in and out of TV commercials.” In 2002 Kathleen went to
Costa Rica to study tropical biology, and later to London to study the music of
the Beatles. In her spare time, Kathleen enjoys writing “compulsively, for
hours at a time,” and is particularly fond of movies.
|
|
| District I - Massachusetts
|
Anna Katharine Weiss
Degree: Harvard University: A.B., History and Literature, 2003 |
| Anna Weiss’s senior thesis on the writings of Ivan
Turgenev continues what has been a four-year pursuit of her love of
nineteenth-century Russian literature and intellectual history. Anna spent two
summers living and working in Russia, and her internship at the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace in Moscow helped her fuse her passion for
Russia’s literary and historical past with her concern for its future. Anna
spent fourteen years training to be a ballet dancer and deferred enrollment at
Harvard for two years in order to pursue a professional dance career in the New
York metro area, where she performed with several regional companies. She has
studied with coaches from the Kirov Ballet, the New York City Ballet, and
American Ballet Theater and attended such schools as the Boston Ballet School,
the San Francisco Ballet School, and the American Ballet Theater School. Anna
served as the director of the Harvard Ballet Company, where she conceived and
directed a full evening of dance on Harvard’s largest stage—the Loeb Drama
Center Mainstage. She also worked as a tutor for an after-school program for
under-privileged children in Roxbury, Massachusetts. She aspires to a career in
United States foreign policy, working specifically on the development of Russia
and the other republics of the former Soviet Union. She enjoys “hiking, reading
novels, learning new choreography, and making (and eating) dessert!”
|
|
| District VI - North Dakota
|
Heidi Lie Williams
Degree: Dartmouth College: B.A., Mathematics, 2003 |
| A “proud North Dakota native,” Heidi Williams is
studying mathematics at Dartmouth, where she is concentrating her studies and
research in algebra and number theory. Heidi published a paper on her research
in mathematical cryptography, spent several months in Hungary studying with the
Budapest Semesters in Mathematics program, and participated in classified
mathematics research with the National Security Agency. Heidi’s senior thesis
explores a problem tied to the application of elliptic curves to the problem of
factorization. A Truman Scholar and one of Glamour
Magazine’s “2002 Top Ten College Women,” Heidi is involved with numerous
mathematics-education projects at Dartmouth, including several programs and
research projects intended to encourage girls and women in mathematics, the
sciences, and engineering. Additionally, Heidi worked to establish a program
for New Hampshire and Vermont middle school girls that addresses issues of
educational inequality against a backdrop of problems that girls face during
adolescence, such as self-esteem and body image. She also works as a writing
assistant at Dartmouth’s Composition Center and is active in ballet and modern
dance. Heidi intends to spend her life “making contributions to mathematical
research, leading students to discover passions for their own pursuits though
education, and working towards permanent change in areas of public policy.” At
Oxford, she hopes to spend her time “studying all things mathematical,” but
also looks forward to dancing and traveling.
|
|
| District II - West Virginia
|
Lindsey Ohlsson Worth
Degree: Harvard University: A.B., Philosophy, 2002 |
| Lindsey Worth graduated summa cum laude
from Harvard in June 2002, where she was elected to
Phi Beta Kappa and received numerous academic awards. As an undergraduate she
did graduate-level work on Kant and her honors thesis on Kant’s “Formula of
Humanity” was awarded the Carrier Prize for the best thesis or doctoral
dissertation in moral and political philosophy. Lindsey’s interests combine
theory with practice—she spent her summers serving in government in a variety
of capacities: writing press releases and policy reports for her Congressman,
observing trials and doing research for the victim-witness unit at the U.S.
Attorney’s Office in Baltimore, and helping attorneys at the Office of the
Solicitor General prepare Supreme Court briefs. She currently works for federal
prosecutors in the Health Care Fraud Unit of the Boston U.S. Attorney’s Office,
where she “does everything from meeting with defense counsel to conducting
legal research to assisting FBI and FDA agents in investigations.” In her “free
time” at Harvard, Lindsey helped an independent scholar write law review
articles, worked two jobs at Harvard Business School, was a varsity member of
the parliamentary debate society, performed on the flute in several ensembles
and in pit orchestras for musicals, played intramural athletics and
recreational sports, helped build theater sets, and volunteered for a local
political campaign and a community service organization. Now that graduation
has “given me a chance to relax,” Lindsey enjoys “exploring Boston with family
and friends, attempting to cook with my roommates, and getting beaten by my
boyfriend in any game or sport imaginable.” She looks forward to “learning some
new sports at Oxford and to seeing the world!”
|
|
2002 Rhodes Scholars Elected
2001 Rhodes Scholars Elected
2000 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1999 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1998 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1997 Rhodes Scholars Elected
1996 Rhodes Scholars Elected