Holy Cross Seniors Compete for Prestigious Fellowships

The Committee on Graduate Studies and Fellowships announced recently that a total of 37 seniors and one alumna have applied for four highly selective post-graduate fellowships, including the Rhodes Scholarship, for study at Oxford University; the Marshall Scholarship, for study at any university in the United Kingdom; Fulbright Scholarships, funding research projects or English-language teaching assistantships in countries around the world; and Watson Traveling Fellowships, requiring design of a project that will occupy the candidate outside of the United States for a full year.

Each student submitted a preliminary application to the Committee and was then interviewed by Committee members.

Mary Lee Ledbetter, graduate studies advisor, said "the Committee’s decision on the Watson nominations was particularly difficult because of the large number of interesting, imaginative, and ambitious projects proposed by this year’s senior class.

"Students proposed travels based on long-standing interests, both academic and personally meaningful, ranging from Community Soccer in Developing Countries to the Status of World-War II Battlefields as Memorials in Western Europe to Painting Oppression and Rebellion in Latin America. Every student had thought deeply about how to carry out such projects with total independence, requiring them to be resourceful, persistent, and adaptable to circumstances that cannot be completely anticipated," she said.  "Many had already prepared by mastering languages of the countries they hoped to visit, assembling lists of contacts and locations to visit from their own research and following suggestions from Holy Cross faculty and others in the field, and persuading anxious parents that they were ready to take on the world!"

The process resulted in the nomination of four students for Watson Traveling Fellowships. They are:

* Rachelle Beaudoin, for "Following the Paper Trail: Handmade Paper in Japan, Tibet, India, and Australia" * Alpha Gingrich, for "Dancing the Trail of the Ramayana: Study of Dance Technique in Indonesia and India" * Eric Studt, for "The Development of Liturgical Music in Latin America" in places like Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina" * Olivia-Thao (Libby) Vo, for "A Life Like Mine: Studying Birth Defects in Southeast Asian Children and Orphans of War"

Two of the 18 students applying for the nomination were named runners-up. They are: Jonathan Lopez, for "Rhythms of Liberation: Investigating Dance in the African-Caribbean Slave Culture" and Azizi Seixas, for "Jonkunoo: Myth, Memory, Identity in Afro-Caribbean Celebration."

In addition to the Watson Fellowships, three students have applied for Marshall Scholarships, one for a Rhodes Scholarship. Rachelle Beaudoin has been selected by the New Hampshire Rhodes Selection Committee to be interviewed in mid-November, the next stage in the Rhodes selection process.

Twenty-five students applied for Fulbright awards. Teaching assistantships are being sought in Chile, Spain, France, Belgium, Germany, Romania, Taiwan and Korea. Research and creative arts proposals have been submitted to study in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Vietnam, Thailand and Peru.

The Committee congratulates all the applicants for their initiative and creativity.

Related information:

# Graduate Studies