<p>Great</a> heights: These undergrads set on solving problems - USATODAY.com</p>
<p>Joshua Lotz
Ohio State University
Hometown: Willoughby, Ohio Age: 23
Major: Biochemistry (bachelor’s) and Chinese (master’s)
GPA: 3.86 Graduating: June
Career goal: Medical doctor focusing on public health in rural and indigenous populations</p>
<p>Zachary Kaufman
Dartmouth College
Hometown: Madison, Wis. Age: 21
Major: Health and society in Latin America and the Caribbean
GPA: 3.85 Graduating: June
Career goal: International public health</p>
<p>Christine George
Virginia Tech
Hometown: Manassas, Va. Age: 21
Major: Biological sciences
GPA: 3.97 Graduating: May
Career goal: Physician with a focus on infectious diseases and global health</p>
<p>Shuai (Steve) Xu
Rice University
Hometown: Diamond Bar, Calif. Age: 20
Major: Bioengineering
GPA: 4.13 Graduating: May 2009
Career goal: Physician or physician/MBA</p>
<p>Carl Brinton
Brigham Young University
Hometown: New York City Age: 22
Major: Asian studies and economics
GPA: 3.93 Graduating: April 2009
Career goal: Politics</p>
<p>Kurt Herzer
Johns Hopkins University
Hometown: Melville, N.Y. Age: 20
Major: Public health
GPA: 3.87 Graduating: May 2009
Career goal: Physician-scientist/professor</p>
<p>Rajiv Srinivasan
U.S. Military Academy at West Point
Hometown: Roanoke, Va. Age: 21
Major: Comparative politics and Arabic
GPA: 3.81 Graduating: May
Career goal: Politics</p>
<p>Carmen Kut
Johns Hopkins University
Hometown: Hong Kong Age: 22
Major: Biomedical engineering
GPA: 3.96 Graduating: May
Career goal: Public health and medicine</p>
<p>Mark Dlugash
Swarthmore College
Hometown: New Rochelle, N.Y. Age: 21
Major: Honors psychology and education
GPA:3.9 Graduating:June
Career goal: Human rights law</p>
<p>Renee Rivas
University of Alabama
Hometown: Richardson, Texas Age: 21
Major: Biology
GPA: 4.0 Graduating: May
Career goal: Translational research in medicine</p>
<p>Melis Anahtar
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Hometown: Bethesda, Md. Age: 21
Major: Mechanical engineering
GPA: 4.0 Graduating: June
Career goal: Physician-scientist</p>
<p>Nathan Segal
Yale University
Hometown: Gainesville, Fla. Age: 22
Major: History of science and medicine/ethnicity, race and migration
GPA: 4.0 Graduating: May
Career goal: Public service in health care field</p>
<p>N. Taylor Thompson
Dartmouth College
Hometown: Greensboro, N.C. Age: 22
Major: Anthropology
GPA: 3.80 Graduating: June 2009
Career goal: Entrepreneur, professor</p>
<p>Kuong Ly
Boston College
Hometown: Woburn, Mass. Age: 23
Major: Philosophy and studio art
GPA: 3.708 Graduating: May
Career goal: International law/refugee policy</p>
<p>Farah Shareef
University of Illinois-Chicago
Hometown: Peoria, Ill. Age: 20
Major: Bioengineering with math minor
Career goal: Physician/scientist</p>
<p>Michael Love
Harvard University
Hometown: Fredericksburg, Va. Age: 21
Major: Economics; minor in history of art
GPA: 3.894 Graduating: June
Career goal: Government policy and economic development</p>
<p>Megan McGinnity
Arizona State University
Hometown: Mesa, Ariz. Age: 22
Major: Economics, political science
GPA: 4.0 Graduating: May
Career goal: Diplomat</p>
<p>Tomasz Stryjewski
Louisiana State University
Hometown: Baton Rouge Age: 21
Major: Biological science
GPA: 3.8 Graduated: December 2007
Career goal: Physician, global health leader</p>
<p>Alexander Hertel-Fernandez
Northwestern University
Hometown: West Lafayette, Ind. Age: 21
Major: Political science
GPA: 3.521 Graduating: June
Career goal: Global public health</p>
<p>Emily Morell
Yale University
Hometown: Oakland Age: 20
Major: Molecular, cellular, developmental biology
GPA: 3.95 Graduating: May 2009
Career goal: Medicine and global health policy</p>
<p>Thanks for posting the list (i’m usually too lazy to go to the links…)</p>
<p>One important thing that I hope people notice, is that all these people aren’t coming from HYP etc. schools. It’s good to see some quality public schools here.</p>
<p>There certainly are great students at public schools. However, the USA today team really isn’t about who is the best student. The best students at HYP or state universities would most often either not make the team or not even think to apply. The USA Today team is really about who has a strong community service/leadership record and a very good GPA, sort of like the Rhodes Scholars.</p>
<p>Why is everyone either doing medicine or politics?</p>
<p>^^lol, because the award is slanted toward those that would have loads of community service/leadership activities >> pre-meds + politicians.</p>
<p>The Rhodes Scholarship almost never goes to true scholars, either.</p>
<p>
Two questions 1) Who makes up that group of “best students” and “true scholars”? 2) You mention big community service and big leadership . Do they by their nature rule out “best students” and “true scholars”? Or is something else going on?</p>
<p>collegealum314,</p>
<p>From where have you gained these fascinating insights about Rhodes and USA Today winners? </p>
<p>Do I see some sour grapes here? Or just someone who does not know the process?</p>
<p>Despite gender imbalances at colleges/universities skewed in favor of women, this “team” is skewed in favor of men.</p>
<p>newmassdad, I’m no expert on either, but my observation of Rhodes Scholars that I knew was that they were very good but not academically the brightest students I knew. They were generally bright, very engaging, generally very well-rounded and the kind of people you’d like to have over for dinner. The absolute best students were often not as well-rounded. I know nothing about the USA Today group, but it does seem to focus on people who intend to go into serving the community and not into scholarship. No knock on that, but it again may rule out the best mathematics, physics, chemistry, classics and psychology majors. The self-selection toward medicine and public service would rule out people interested in reseach in academic fields. Best is subjective but if by best one meant those most likely to advance their fields as scholars, they would likely not be included in the USA Today group as characterized by the earlier poster or the Rhodes (with some notable exceptions).</p>
<p>shawbridge,</p>
<p>I suspect your conclusions, and probably those of collegealum, stem from your definition of “absolute best”. This is a pretty subjective determination. And I suspect it may be difficult to distinguish among the best within a particular group.</p>
<p>At any rate, of the Rhodes scholars I know, all of them are at the top of their college’s academic pecking order. One, for example, has a 4.0 at MIT. But to the degree that you determine brilliance on factors other than grades, you might be able to identify more brilliant by whatever criterion you use.</p>
<p>I suppose it is worth remembering that Rhodes Scholars are not selected just based on academic brilliance. Superior academic performance is a threshold requirement, but the selectors look beyond that. They say they are looking for future leaders in their fields. How they do this only they know for sure. </p>
<p>Regarding the majors of winners, if you looked at this years Rhodes winners, you should find a surprisingly generous portion of physical sciences and engineering majors.</p>
<p>newmassdad is correct about Rhodes Scholars being “at the top of their college’s academic pecking order.” True, they are also incredibly well-rounded, but at most universities, you can’t even apply for a Rhodes without at least a 3.8 GPA.</p>
<p>I don’t disagree. The Rhodes that I know were strong to very strong students. All with good academic performance. But, with a couple of exceptions were not the brightest kids in their majors. </p>
<p>Regarding the majors of winners, no issue there either. I think I was commenting on the USA Today selection criterion more than the Rhodes. But, I sense that the Rhodes selection may emphasize a variety of other factors including how personable one is in a series of interviews. Some of the brilliant scholar types would not thrive in those settings. No knock on the Rhodes folks intended. I agree that the criteria include academic strength but other things as well, which may lead them to sacrifice a little bit of academic brilliance when balanced against the other criteria.</p>
<p>Finally, generally I don’t see grades as a true measure of brilliance. Brilliance is often lopsided – the person most likely to make major contributions in some area of theoretical physics may well be relatively weak at literary analysis. He/she wouldn’t look as strong to the Rhodes Committee as a very good, very hard-working student who does well in all courses. But, the physics student might well not apply as they might prefer just to complete grad school quickly. That said, a truly brilliant friend spent 3 years at Oxford as a Rhodes and completed his D.Phil. in math. But, I’d guess (no data) that he’d be more the exception than the rule as Oxford does not have the faculty that it once had in many areas. Students just interested in pursuing excellence in research without a broader political or social agenda may not want to apply.</p>
<p>Here’s an interesting link about prepping for a Rhodes. One implication: performing well at the cocktail party and interview are very important. Not necessarily a strength of Math Olympiad winners. [How</a> to Win a Rhodes - New York Times](<a href=“http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A07EFDA133EF931A25752C0A9659C8B63]How”>http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A07EFDA133EF931A25752C0A9659C8B63)</p>
<p>I suspect shawbridge is right. </p>
<p>We can put this to rest simply by doing a bit of reverse-engineering. Pick up all the recent Nobel Prize, Field Medal, etc. winners and see how many of them won the Rhodes.</p>
<p>In fact, you can look at where they earn their first degree to see if HYPMC really admit the “best and the brightest”.</p>
<p>I expect to be surprised.</p>
<p>The definition of “absolute best” is what is important here, as newmassdad so correctly pointed out. If what some of you are saying is that there may be some anti-social Kaczynski clone out there who might have a few IQ points on some of the Rhodes/USA Today folks (as if they are all the same) I’ll be happy to agree. The idea that those folks are the “absolute best” or the “best and brightest”? Well, that would be hard to support when the subjective “best” is a descriptor. Some may eschew “cocktail party” banter. Others may have no use for booger-picking.
</p>
<p>The ability to communicate ideas and the ability to interact with others are components I would require in any selection of “best student”. Some may think it should be high score on an interactive video game. Each of us gets to choose what goes into being the “best”, don’t we? Why should the Rhodes or USA Today folks be any more limited than the rest of us?</p>
<p>Having re-read my post , I realize that some on the other side of this issue may be offended. I would like to omit “booger-picking” from my post above and replace it with “digital nostril exploration” . Hope that helps. I don’t want anyone to lose sight of what’s important and start arguing over terminology when there are much more important boogers to pick.</p>
<p>Curm,
As you so wisely pointed out long ago, part of what these selection processes entail is the ability to represent the sponsoring program – you described this in terms of major scholarship awards at colleges, but I think the analogy is just as appropriate here. I’m not saying emotional intelligence should be the main criteria (and by the looks of these kids, they all are stellar!) – but that at a certain level , one needs to be able to effectively and graciously handle being an ambassador for the program and one’s accomplishments. (Not that I’m picking a booger with you, you understand…) ;)</p>
<p>I agree wholeheartedly, CD.</p>
<p>No problem with Rhodes or USA Today balancing presentational skills and athletic participation against pure academic abilities. But, in fields like mathematics and physics, presentational skills are not that important relative to raw processing power in determining who makes the major contributions. that extra standard deviation or two out in mathematical ability, which usually is negatively correlated with social skills, when combined with drive, will more likely determine. Thus, the Rhodes criteria are unlikely to get the best of the best in those fields. In political science and other fields where clarity of thinking is very important but persuasiveness is also key since there typically aren’t any “right answers” and just good/compelling frameworks, social and presentations skills will be more important. A lot of the Rhodes folks that I know were in PPE.</p>
<p>Incidentally, most of the Nobel prize winners in economics whom I know would not be that strong in a cocktail party environment. Tom Schelling, who is as brilliant and creative a person as I’ve come across, is rather awkward socially, doesn’t make small talk, and I doubt would come across well in a cocktail party setting. No Rhodes, but they don’t make them any deeper or smarter.</p>
<p>So, curmudgeon, no problem with your definition of best, but what it less like lt to lead to are the folks who make the major contributions in certain academic fields. But, they are likely much more interesting in cocktail party conversation and much better as presenters.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Well, let’s take a look.</p>
<p>Scanning the last few years of Nobel winners (those who were educated in the US) and the schools at which they earned their first degree we see:</p>
<p>2007
Eric Maskin - Harvard
Roger Myerson - Harvard
Albert Gore - Harvard
Mario Capecchi - Antioch College</p>
<p>2006
Edmund Phelps - Amherst
Roger Kornberg - Harvard
John Mather - Swarthmore
George Smoot - MIT
Andrew Fire - UC Berkeley
Craig Mello - Brown</p>
<p>2005
Robert Auman - CUNY
Thomas Schelling - UC Berkeley
Robert Grubbs - Univ. of Florida
Richard Schrock - UC Riverside
Roy Glauber - Harvard
John Hall - Carnegie Mellon</p>
<p>2004
Edward Prescott - Swarthmore
Irwin Rose - Univ. of Chicago
Richard Axel - Columbia
Linda Buck - Univ. of Washington
Frank Wilczek - University of Chicago
David Politizer - Univ. of Michigan</p>
<p>With a very few exceptions, it looks like a pretty solid group of graduates from mostly Ivy League, high-end LACs, and high-end public schools. If Nobel is your measure of “best and brightest” (which is certainly a debatable point), it looks like the high-end schools do a pretty good job of enrolling them to begin with and/or producing them once they are there.</p>