NEWS

Photo note: To download photos of the winners, see end of release.

Six Carolina students win distinguished scholarships

CHAPEL HILL -- Six University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill undergraduates have won prestigious national scholarships this spring, and decisions are still pending in three other top programs with Carolina students in contention.

In recent weeks, foundations offering some of the most competitive merit awards in the country have announced winners for 2003. UNC students won one Churchill, one Luce, one Truman and three Goldwater scholarships.

Their awards followed selection last December of Carolina senior Karine Dubè of Canada for a Rhodes Scholarship, perhaps the top academic award in the world. That brings the number of distinguished scholarship wins for Carolina students in 2002-2003 to seven – and counting.

"We at Carolina are extremely proud of the academic achievements of these students and happy to see them receive such well deserved recognition," said Dr. Robert Greenberg, director of UNC’s Office of Distinguished Scholarships and Intellectual Life. "Their dedication to future careers that will serve the good of so many will bring honor to Carolina in the years to come."

Carolina winners this spring are:

• David Lyndon W. Angeles of Kings Mountain, 20, a junior international studies and French major, won one of 76 Harry S. Truman Scholarships awarded nationwide among 635 candidates. Winners must have outstanding leadership potential and communication skills, be in the top quarter of their class and be committed to careers in public service. The scholarship provides $30,000 -- $3,000 for the senior year and $27,000 for graduate study. Angeles is the only North Carolina winner. He brings the number of UNC Truman winners since 1992 to 14.
  
  
• Carl Erik Fisher, 22, of Glen Ridge, N.J., a senior biology and music major, won one of 15 Luce Scholarships awarded nationwide among 110 candidates. The Henry Luce Foundation provides for a year's internship in Asia and aims to acquaint future American leaders who have no prior experience of Asia with the continent and their Asia counterparts. Winners are chosen for highest academic achievement and outstanding leadership ability. The award’s value varies with each winner’s assignment and location. Carolina ranks second behind Harvard University in numbers of Luce Scholars. Fisher is UNC’s 23rd winner since the program began in 1974.
  
  
• Bennett Rogers, 22, of Durham, who graduated with highest honors in December, won one of 11 Churchill Scholarships among 61 candidates nationwide. The Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States presents the awards for a year of graduate study at England’s University of Cambridge. The scholarships, valued at about $27,000 each, reward outstanding academic and extracurricular accomplishments. Recipients are American undergraduates planning to pursue graduate studies in science, mathematics and engineering. Since 1993, nine UNC students have won the Churchill.
  
  
• Juniors Nathaniel T. Calloway of Durham, Joshua A. Carter of Winston-Salem and sophomore C. Michael Minder of Matthews won 2003-2004 Goldwater Scholarships, merit awards given to sophomores and juniors who intend to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences or engineering. The Barry M. Goldwater Foundation chose 300 winners nationwide among 1,093 nominated by faculty members and U.S. colleges and universities. The scholarship provides up to $7,500 per year for educational expenses to juniors and sophomores who display intellectual curiosity and intensity and possess potential for significant future contributions in their chosen field. Records kept by math professor Dr. Norberto Kerzman show that with this year’s winners, UNC has had 22 Goldwater Scholars since the program began in late 1986.
  

Angeles, co-president of the Campus Y and a Morehead Scholar at Carolina, will use the award to earn a dual masters, in international relations from Johns Hopkins University and in business administration at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

He aims to work afterward for an international human rights group to improve the lots of refugees around the world, who live in substandard conditions but cannot return home because of war or oppressive regimes. Next year, as a UNC senior, Angeles will study abroad at the Institut d’ètudes Politiques de Paris.

He is a graduate of the N.C. School of Science and Math with a 3.7 grade-point average and a founding member of the UNC Achordants, a male a cappella group whose mission is service and diversity through the performance of music.

Fisher, also with a 3.7 grade-point average, is a member of the UNC Hospital Committee and Phi Beta Kappa, heads the pre-medical honor society and is musical director of the male a cappella group the Clef Hangers. Since his first semester at UNC, he as been researching causes of developmental diseases.

The summer after his freshman year, Fisher won a National Science Foundation Fellowship to Boston University, where he studied environmental factors associated with developmental disorders. His goals are to become a neuroscientist, conducting research, teaching university students and treating patients, and to sing opera in his spare time.

With the Luce, Fisher wants to see how Eastern medical centers operate. The foundation hasn’t yet specified his placement in Asia, but he knows that he will conduct medical neuroscience research in an urban academic center.

Rogers will work toward a master’s degree at Cambridge, researching computer speech and language processing. Eventually he will pursue a doctorate in computer science, focusing on artificial intelligence and evolutionary computation, and seek to become a professor at a major research university.

After graduating from Jordan High School in Durham in 1998, Rogers won National Merit and Robert C. Byrd scholarships and entered UNC as an honors student. Physics professor Dr. Thomas Clegg invited Rogers to work with him on developing a new ion source system for Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratories. Rogers, a computer science major, presented his findings at a regional meeting of the American Physical Society in the fall of his sophomore year.

He earned a 3.98 grade-point average at Carolina and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. He has played trombone and has performed with UNC’s wind ensemble, orchestra, chamber groups and jazz band.

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Photo urls:

• Angles, David : http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/angeles_david.jpg
• Calloway, Nathaniel: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/calloway_nathaniel.jpg
• Carter, Joshua: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/carter_joshua.jpg
• Fisher, Carl: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/fisher_carl.jpg
• Minder, Michael: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/minder_michael.jpg
• Rogers, Bennett: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/rogers_bennett.jpg

Contact: Dr. Robert Greenberg, 843-7764 or 962-7550, Greenberg@unc.edu
News Services contact: L.J. Toler, 962-8589, laura_toler@unc.edu