The winners of this year’s Rhodes Scholarships were announced Saturday and, for the third year in a row, no University of Michigan students were among them.
One Michigan resident did win, though. Brett Masters, a senior at Princeton University, who hails from Charlotte, won an award and plans to study medieval history and literature at Oxford.
The schools with the most winners were the University of Chicago and Stanford University, with three winners each. A student from Ohio State University won one, while two students from St. Olaf College, a small liberal arts college in Northfield, Minn., won the prestigious awards.
Showing Initiative
Dissatisfied with the rising cost of an education at California’s public universities, California college students have filed a ballot initiative that would prevent the University of California and the California State University system from raising tuition for the next five years. Fees at the two schools have roughly doubled over the last five years.
The tuition freeze would be paid for with a 1 percent tax on taxpayers making more than $1 million annually.
The students would need about 434,000 signatures within the next five months for the initiative to be placed on the ballot. There are 600,000 students at Cal and Cal State institutions.
A break with tradition
Every year, as football season comes to a close, Clemson University holds a pep rally called “Big Thursday.” As part of that pep rally, students usually burn an effigy of Cocky, the mascot of the University of South Carolina, which is Clemson’s in-state archrival.
But after a fire at a beach house last month in which six South Carolina and one Clemson student were killed, Clemson officials decided that would be inappropriate and cancelled the traditional burning of the rooster mascot.
“We look forward to having the traditional Big Thursday come back next year, but this year was definitely not the right time,” said Anastasia Thyroff, a Clemson senior and co-chair of the rally’s organizing committee, in a statement released by the University.
‘U’ on notice
College officials have voiced concern about a clause in the Higher Education Act, up for reauthorization in Congress, that would create a “watch list” of colleges that have instituted above-average tuition increases.
They say circumstances beyond their control often lead to the increases. The University of Michigan, for instance, has raised tuition in response to declining state funding.
Other measures have been proposed to curb the rising cost of college tuition. Rep. Michael Castle (R-Del.) proposed an amendment that would cut federal funding for student aid to colleges that don’t reverse their tuition increases, Inside Higher Ed reported.