November 24, 2003
Students, Grad Receive Rhodes, Marshall Awards
EVANSTON, Ill. --- A Northwestern University senior has been named
a Rhodes Scholar this year, while another senior and a recent graduate
both have been awarded Marshall Scholarships. The prestigious scholarships,
awarded to top American college students and recent graduates,
provide funding for two or possibly three years of graduate study
in Great Britain.
Cristina Bejan, of Durham, N.C., received a Rhodes Scholarship
this weekend. She is majoring in philosophy and theater at Northwestern.
A playwright and actress as well as a student of philosophy, Bejan
is a passionate advocate for ethnic and religious tolerance in
Romania. She has written five
plays, two of which were produced last year while she was a visiting student
at St. Anne’s College of Oxford University. At Oxford, she plans to continue
her studies in philosophy.
Bejan is writing
her honors thesis on the applicability of Kant’s
moral theory of autonomy to newly free societies, particularly
Romania. She has spent significant time in Eastern Europe and interned
for Freedom House Bucharest in the summer of 2002.
In addition to her studies and playwriting, Bejan also plays
ice hockey and is an avid basketball fan.
Tracy Carson, a Northwestern senior majoring in history and legal
studies, received a Marshall Scholarship. Carson also recently
received the Student Laureate Award for 2003 from the Lincoln Academy
of Illinois.
A native of
Chicago, Carson has been a member of Northwestern’s
national-championship debate team for three years. She was the
first African-American woman to win a major national debate tournament.
She has organized debate tournaments for high schools in Chicago.
Carson also is a campus leader at Northwestern. She is president
of For Members Only, the Northwestern Black Student Alliance, and
serves on numerous campus committees. She also is the assistant
program director for Reading Rays of Light, a weekly tutoring program
for youth on the south side of Chicago.
Carson plans
to study for a Mlitt (Master’s of Letters)
in history at the University of Oxford, studying South Africa’s
anti-apartheid movement. She plans a career in civil rights law.
Her research at Oxford will enable her to understand how non-violent
movements uniquely affect impoverished communities.
Another Marshall Scholarship was awarded to Kate Elswit. Originally
from New York City, Elswit graduated summa cum laude from Northwestern
in 2002 with a double major in dance and comparative literature.
(Marshall Scholarships are awarded to recent graduates, as well
as current students.) As an undergraduate, she received a research
grant to create and perform a one-woman show based on the life
and work of Austrian artist Egon Schiele.
Elswit currently
performs as a member of Hedwig Dances, a Chicago dance company.
She also teaches dance, with students ranging from
children with behavior disorders to bond traders and African refugee
women’s groups.
Elswit has been accepted in European Dance Theatre Practice at
Laban in London. She will study semiotics, such as Laban movement
analysis, alongside choreographic practice. She intends to choreograph
narrative works that reinvent modern dance as a more widely accessible
art form without compromising content.
The Rhodes Scholarship awarded to Bejan is the first received
by a Northwestern student since 1994. Those scholarships, the oldest
of the international study awards available to American students,
were created in 1902 by the will of Cecil Rhodes, a British philanthropist
and colonial pioneer.
A total of 963 students nominated by 366 colleges and universities
applied for one of the 32 awards this year. All Rhodes Scholars
study at Oxford University.
The Marshall Scholarships finance young Americans of high ability
to study for a degree in the United Kingdom. Up to forty Scholars
are selected each year to study either at graduate or occasionally
undergraduate level at an UK institution in any field of study.
The scholarships were created by the British government in 1953
and commemorate the humane ideals of the European Recovery Program,
known as the Marshall Plan.
In recent years, Northwestern students have been very successful
in competing for the Marshall Scholarships. In the past six years,
nine Northwestern students or recent graduates have been awarded
Marshall Scholarships.
Approximately 1,000 students applied for the 40 Marshall Scholarships
this year.
“We’re absolutely thrilled to have a Rhodes Scholar
this year, and we’re also very pleased to continue to be
well-represented among the distinguished ranks of Marshall Scholars,” said
Sara Vaux, director of Northwestern’s office of fellowships. “These
three young women are all remarkable individuals, and the University
is extremely proud of them.” |