0 0 0 I B h Mchgn aiy-.dnsdyMach21 20 The real reason you didn't win 7 a Rhodes Scholarship When it comes to helping its top students win prestigious scholarships, the University just can't keep up with the Ivies. Jf you have your heart set on becoming a Rhodes Scholar, the first thing you should do is transfer to Yale. As soon as you arrive in New Haven, you'll want to go directly to the Yale office of International Education and Fellowship Pro- grams, located at 55 Whitney Ave., New Haven, Conn. Once you get there you should be in good shape. Don't worry too much about the application; the Yale advisors will take care of almost everything. Just sit back and let them handle it. Before long,you'llbe readytojointhe scores of other Yale students who have won the most prestigious scholarship in the world. It is not that it is impossible to win a Rhodes Scholarship if you're applying from the University of Michigan - it happened as recent- ly as 2005. It's just that if you go to Harvard or Yale, your chances of doing it are much better. This year, students from Yale took seven of the 32 Rhodes Schol- arships handedoutannually.Appli- cants from Harvard won six. The University has not hada stu- dent win the Rhodes since 2005, when Joseph Jewell, a physics graduate student who had attended the California Institute of Technol- ogy as an undergrad, won one. That year, Harvard students took five Rhodes Scholarships. Is it the University's fault or are our applicants being pushed aside because of the University's sub-Ivy reputation? "The Rhodes keeps its prestige up by selecting a lot of students from Harvard and Yale," said Les- ter Monts, vice provost for academ- ic affairs. Even if the Rhodes committee does prefer Ivy League applicants, that bias might be the least of the problems of Rhodes hopefuls at the University. THE NOMINATION PROCESS The reason Harvard and Yale students regularly account for about 40 percent of Rhodes Schol- arship winners isn't because their top students are substantially brighter than their peers at other prestigious colleges. Harvard and Yale students fare better because their schools are better at identifying, recruiting and coaching students who are bright enough to win prestigious scholar- ships and awards. Most scholarships require an applicant to submit essays, let- ters of recommendation and cur- riculum vitae. But some of the most competitive and prestigious schol- arships - Rhodes, Marshall and Mitchell - also require applicants to be endorsed by their college or university. At the University of Michigan, the endorsement process is the responsibility of the provosts coun- cil on student honors, which is run out of the vice provost for student affairs office. Gretchen Weir, assistant vice provost for academic affairs, over- sees the council. In an interview last December shortly after the Rhodes decisions were handed down in November, Weir said the council's primary goal is to identify exceptional students from across the University and encourage them to apply for the prestigious British scholarships. The council e-mails all students whose GPA is over 3.7 to encourage them to attend informational ses- sions about the scholarships held each January and February. She estimates that about 100 students attend the sessions each year, and about 17 to 20 of those students apply for University endorsement. After deliberation, the council, which is made up of faculty from all schools and colleges, endorses a handful of students for the Rhodes, Marshalland Mitchellscholarships. In recent years, the University has endorsed about five students a year, most of whom were endorsed for all three scholarships. And sometimes the University endorses the same students multiple years.Alum Lyric Chen, who won the Marshall schol- arship this year, was endorsed for the Rhodes, Marshall and Mitchell scholarships by the University the previous year as well. Weir said the University does not have a set rule regarding how many students to endorse, but she said they want to make sure the Univer- sity's candidates are not competing "needlessly" against each other. "We try to add value to each of our nominees," Weir said. "If the You didn't win a Rhodes scholarship. But it might not be your fault. University submitted 10 nominees, that would undercut the University in the eyes of the Rhodes commit- tee." But routinely nominating 20 or more students does not seemto have undercut schools like Harvard and Yale in the eyes of the Rhodes com- mittee. Ahough since the scholar- ships are handed out based on 16 geographic regions, schools like Harvard and Yale probably ben- efit from drawing the top students from around the country. MISSING APPLICANTS The University's Rhodes drought seems to have more to do with hav- ing too few applicants than having too many nominees. Monts acknowledged that the University has a hard time recruit- ing Rhodes applicants compared with schools like Harvard and Yale. "We just don't have the mecha- nisms that some of the smaller prestigious private schools have," Monts said. At schools like Yale, students interact closely with faculty for their whole college career. Small classes - ones taught by profes- sors, not graduate students - are a regular feature of a student's schedule from their first day on campus. This close contact allows Yale faculty to identify outstand- ing students early, refer them to the Yale office of International Educa- tion and Fellowship Programs and encourage then to apply. The University of Michigan does not have a similar infrastructure. The first time most students hear about the scholarships from the University is when they receive a mass e-mail from Lester Monts' office - an impersonal message that is neither signed nor has a reply address. Not surprisingly, few students attend the informational sessions put on by the council and even fewer apply for University endorsement. Furthermore, Monts said the University does not an internal recruitment mechanism like that of Yale or Harvard. Many students, especially underclassmen, aren't close enough to their professors to get noticed. "Many times we don't really dis- cover the genius of students until they are nominated by faculty," Monts said. "In a way, our stu- dents are on their own the first two years." UNTAPPED POTENTIAL The University does not lack potential Rhodes Scholarship win- ners. Every year, University of Michigan graduates gain places in the most prestigious graduate and professional schools in the world. The quality of students is high, but the University still doesn't win its share of Rhodes Scholarships. LSA senior Dan Ray is one exam- ple of missed potential. Ray, who will be attending Harvard Law in the fall and who teaches LSAT courses, won the University's most competitive merit-based scholar- ship. But even though the Univer- sity singled out Ray as one of its top four students by awarding him the Bentley Scholarship, they did not make a significant effort to encour- age him to apply for a prestigious British scholarship. Ray simply received the same mass e-mail that every other 3.7 GPA student at the University does. The University's lack of Rhodes infrastructure is not insignificant. Applying for a Rhodes, Marshall or Mitchell scholarship is a lot of work. An applicant must secure numerous letters of recommenda- tion and be prepared for intensive interviews if they are selected as a finalist. The University does provide mock interviews and help with letters of recommen- dation for the students it decides to endorse. But the preparation pales in comparison to a nominee from Yale. There, applicants are walked through the process by a few employees who work full- time coaching Yale students for prestigious British scholarships. By contrast, the University hasn't dedicated even one full-time employee to the undertaking. Monts said the students nomi- nated by the University should have no trouble winning presti- gious awards. "We get people to the national levels," Monts said. "And after the national level, it is a crap shoot." There is a bit of subjectivity to all highly competitive,. interview- based awards. I But the reason the University does not win more Rhodes Scholar- ships is not because of the random nature of the process, as Monts. suggests.° Rather it is because the Univer- sity does not make a serious effort to tap its vast potential of competi- tive Rhodes applicants and fails to give them the support they need to win. TALKING POINTS Three things you can talk about this week: 1. "Bong hits 4 Jesus" 2. Alberto Gonzalez 3. The end of the Tommy Amaker era And three things you can't: 1. How drunk you were on St. Patrick's Day 2. American Idol 3. The relative experi- ence of the 2008 presi- dential candidates BY THE NUMBERS Dollars the University is dedicating to create new positions for workers who will be displaced when corporate giant Pfizer Co. leaves town Number of jobs that will be lost once Pfizer leaves New research positions that will be created by the fund, though it was also used to make existing positions more attractive toformer Pfizer employees Source: University News Service YOUTUBE VIDEO OF THE WEEK RC student does not bring sexy back Justin Timberlake probably never thought he would be outdone by a Residential College freshman. But if he's seen the YouTube video "Chunkyback," he may change his mind. Try watching this captivating yet slightly disturbing "Sexyback" parody, and you'll understand why "there's more to love." The RC student and his friends perform to lyrics about "thunder thighs," "fried chicken" and "flesh fat," all the while reminding you to "get your chunky on." They sporad- ically molest a Paris Hilton cut-out in the stairwell and spend a consid- erable amount of time gyrating in the halls of East Quad. The highlight of the video is the student's outfit. He takes the stage in a tight blue tee and white booty shorts that leave nothing to the imagination. For those who feel stifled by soci- etal pressures or maybe yearn for a return to the days when chunky was high fashion, thisvideo is liberating. J.T. might benefit from a little time in the East Quad dining hall. - EMILYANGELL See thisaand other YouTube videos of the week at -n ' -'lo nm yr ^/mrl -rnnln Wednesday,M 2007 The Michigan Daily - P. QUOTES OF THE WEEK A lot oftimes whenI "Any kid with a ruler and a camera can make a contribu- was short, I would cre- tion." ate a level of activity - WILLIAM PIKE, a British weather observer for the Royal Meteorological Society, on the difficulty of beforehand that would pinning down evidence that frisbee-sized snow flakes really do exist. Scientists have deemed it likely that drive the futures.... It's giant snow flakes regularly fall around the globe. a fun game." "(On) Saturday I rose from - JIM CRAMER, host of the popular TV show the dead and then died again. "Mad Money," admitting illegally manipulating Tt's not that strange." the markets via his show in a video that's been --- s a e popular on Youtube.com. Cramer said it wasn't SINBAD on the flood of concern and sympathy he something most people would admit and added'received after someone on Wikipedia.org edited the I'm not going to say that on TV. article to say that he had passed away. William of Orange counter celebration - If you were annoyed by all the Papist revelry on the 17th, throw a Northern Irish, protestant party instead. Start pouring the orange beer and have fun reenact- ing the Battle of the Boyne. Throwing this party? Let us know. TheStatement@umich.edu I WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE OF THE WEEK "The Victors" The Victors is the fight song of the University of Michigan. It was composed by University student Louis Elbel in 1898 following the last-minute football victory over the University of Chicago that clinched a league championship. It was later declared by John Philip Sousa as "the greatest college fight song ever written." Today, it is one of the most memorable and famous college fight songs. An abbreviated version of the fight song, based on the final refrain, is played after the football team either scores or makes a big defensive play, such as an interception. Its full lyrics span several verses that run over two minutes long. The melody of the fight song is very similar to the trio section from The Spirit of Lib- erty March. This song is often referred to as "Hail to the Victors," which is not correct. The phrase "champions of the west" is generally understood to be a reference to the fact that the sport of football was then gaining popularity west of the Appalachian Mountains and that, moreover, the Big Ten was widely known as the "Western Conference."