Up Front | Students


(left) Truman Scholars Sarah Sattelmeyer and Matthew Crim. (middle) Goldwater recipients Chris Tarr, Rebekah Rogers, and Amy Sexauer. (right) Gates Cambridge recipient Amanda Casto. Not pictured is an earlier recipient, Marshall Scholar Joe Wolpin (see March ’04 GM).

UGA scores big in Goldwater, Truman, Marshall, and Gates competitions
Scholarship bonanza

It was another banner year for UGA students, whose academic excellence resulted in the University being one of only three public institutions in the country to have six “Grand Slam” scholarship winners.

Comprised of the Rhodes, Marshall, Goldwater, and Truman scholarships, the so-called “Grand Slam” is an unofficial academic honor that UGA enjoyed a year ago, with recipients in all four scholarship competitions. The only other schools in the country to achieve that distinction in 2002-03 were Ivys: Harvard, Yale, and Brown.

“We weren’t quite as fortunate in 2003-04 in that we didn’t win a Rhodes,” says Jere Morehead, associate provost and director of the Honors Program. “But by winning six Grand Slam scholarships—three Goldwaters, two Trumans, and a Marshall—we achieved something that only two other publics [Virginia and Penn State] can claim.”

To illustrate what an incredible year it’s been, the announcement of the Truman was followed in the same week by news that a UGA student had also won the Gates Cambridge Scholarship, which the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hopes will take on Rhodes-type prestige.

Awarded to sophomores and juniors who plan to pursue careers in mathematics, engineering, or the natural sciences, the Goldwater Scholarship provides up to $7,500 to cover the cost of tuition, fees, books and room and board.

UGA’s winners are James C. (Chris) Tarr, a junior from Conyers majoring in chemistry; Amy N. Sexauer, a junior from Wadmalaw Island, S.C., majoring in microbiology and German; and Rebekah L. Rogers, a sophomore from Florence, Ala., majoring in genetics and economics. All three are in the UGA Honors Program.

This is the fourth consecutive year and the seventh in the last eight that a UGA student has won a Goldwater. Nineteen UGA students have now received the award since 1995—13 of those since 2000.

Tarr plans to obtain a doctorate in chemistry and pursue a career in chemistry research. Sexauer intends to earn an advanced degree in microbiology and immunology and pursue a career in biomedical research, focusing on the function of the immune system in diseases. Rogers plans to earn a Ph.D. in biological sciences and pursue a career in molecular genetics research at a university or research institution.

Seventy-seven scholars were selected from 67 institutions nationwide to receive the prestigious Harry S. Truman Scholarship, and UGA was one of only eight institutions to have multiple recipients.

UGA’s Truman Scholars are Matthew Crim, a junior from Cartersville working on dual degrees in cellular biology and political science; and Sarah Sattelmeyer, a junior from Tucker majoring in biology and English. Crim intends to pursue both an M.D. and an M.P.H graduate degree with concentrations in health policy and biological security. Sattelmeyer will pursue M.P.H. and D.P.H. degrees with concentrations in social behavior and reproductive health.

Earlier in the 2003-2004 academic year, Joseph Wolpin (AB ’04), received the prestigious Marshall Scholarship. A 2003 Honors graduate from Tucker with a double major in history and Russian, Wolpin plans to attend the University College of London’s School of Slavonic and Eastern European Studies.

UGA’s Gates Cambridge recipient for 2003-04 is Amanda Casto, a senior from Anderson, S.C., majoring in genetics and cellular biology. She is a Foundation Fellow, a Ramsey Scholar, and last year she received the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship. She currently works in the genetics lab of UGA professor Janet Westpheling.

“It really was an incredible year,” says Jere Morehead. “Only four institutions won more ‘Grand Slam’ scholarships than UGA did: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford. Which means we’re in very good company!”

Supreme Court ruling means race can be part of holistic admissions review
Diversity statement

Using last year’s Supreme Court ruling in the University of Michigan admissions case as a guideline, UGA has begun to develop a new set of admissions criteria designed to create greater racial, geographic, linguistic and experiential diversity in the student body.

The University Council on March 18 approved a statement submitted by its faculty admissions committee that commits UGA to “prepare students to interact in an increasingly diverse workforce and society” by adopting “policies and practices to increase diversity among its entering students.”

The statement specifies four factors for increasing diversity that should be used in evaluating freshman applicants:

• Their race and ethnic background
• Where they live
• Their native language
• Range and quality of their experiences and background

But the statement also requires a “highly individualized, holistic review” of applicants’ files—language the Supreme Court used last summer in ruling that the University of Michigan could not use a point system in undergraduate admissions decisions, but that the university’s law school could consider race as one of several factors in admissions.

Faculty admissions committee members Robert Gatewood and Charles Keith emphasized to the council that the statement is not a new admissions policy. They said it is a set of principles to help the committee and admissions office better understand the educational value of diversity and the notion of a “critical mass” of diverse students—another concept endorsed by the Supreme Court.

The admissions committee and admissions office will develop implementation procedures that will come back to the council as information before they are put into use, Gatewood and Keith said.

For the past two years UGA has based admissions decisions primarily on “demonstrated academic achievement,” and admissions director Nancy McDuff and President Michael F. Adams said that will remain the case under any new criteria.

“The issue is not about admitting students who are not academically prepared,” McDuff said. “It’s making hard choices between students who are equally academically qualified.”

The master’s program in public administration offered by UGA’s School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA) is ranked third in the nation, according to U.S. News & World Report’s “2005 Best Graduate Schools.” SPIA also saw two of its specializations ranked highly: public management and administration (second nationally) and public finance and budgeting (third).

Other UGA colleges and schools ranked among the best in the nation: education (tied for 24th), social work (tied for 28th), law (tied for 31st), and business (42nd).

UGA’s graduate programs in education ranked among the top 14 public universities in the nation and the top three in the Southeast, and five specialty programs ranked in the top ten nationally: secondary education (third), elementary education (tied for third), vocational and technical education (fourth), counseling and personnel services (fifth), and curriculum and instruction (sixth). Three other graduate education programs ranked among the nation’s top 20: educational psychology (13th), higher education administration (18th), and administration/supervision (19th).

The U.S. News rankings also show that UGA’s College of Education was tops in the nation in the number of 2003 graduates licensed to teach at 647, followed by Michigan State at 644 and Penn State at 624.

The full rankings are available in book form, with excerpts in the April 12 issue of the magazine. U.S. News published its first reputation-only graduate school ranking in 1987, with the first issue of “America’s Best Graduate Schools” coming in 1990.