KU News Release

Oct. 16, 2007
Contact: Sue Lorenz, University Honors Program, (785) 864-3374.

KU nominates five for prestigious Rhodes, Marshall scholarship competitions

LAWRENCE — The University of Kansas has nominated five students to compete for prestigious Rhodes and Marshall scholarships, which provide tuition and living expenses for graduate study in Great Britain or Ireland.

The nominees will be honored at a reception from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 24, at the Malott Room in the Kansas Union.

Three students are nominated to compete in both scholarship competitions:
— Nicholas Cris Barnthouse, Leawood senior
— Daniel Patrick Hogan, Leawood senior
— John Michael Kuhn, Jamestown senior

Two are competing in the Marshall competition only:
— Cristina Avelina Fernandez, Washington, D.C., senior
— Katherine “Kate” Carnaby Sullivan, spring 2005 graduate from Lenexa

KU students have won 25 Rhodes scholarships since 1904, more than all other Kansas colleges and universities combined, and nine Marshall scholarships since 1965. Rhodes scholarships were first offered in 1903; Marshalls in 1953. Rhodes scholarships may be used only at Oxford University; Marshall scholarships at any British university.

The Marshall Commission bestows about 40 scholarships nationally. Regional finalists are interviewed in one of eight regions Nov. 5-9. KU nominees selected for regional interviews will travel to Chicago along with other competitors from Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin. The 2008-09 Marshall scholars will be announced after the interviews. Those selected are asked to accept or decline the offer within 12 days.

The Rhodes Foundation selects 32 scholars annually. Rhodes competitions take place Nov. 16 and 17 in 16 U.S. districts. If invited, KU nominees will interview in Kansas City, Mo., alongside competitors from a district that includes Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Mississippi. Two winners are selected from each district and will be announced Nov. 17. Separate state interviews are no longer conducted.

Brief biographical information about each KU nominee follows:

CLOUD COUNTY
From Jamestown 66948

John Michael Kuhn is majoring in English with a goal of researching and teaching the connections between language, identity and nationalism. “Language,” Kuhn said, “marks identity and power as surely as geography.” As a freshman, Kuhn was a promising biochemistry major focused on a career in medicine. In his sophomore year, an elective course in Shakespeare, he said, transformed not only his opinion of the study of language and literature but eventually his career plans. As a participant in the University Scholars Program, KU’s mentoring program offered to 20 top sophomores annually, Kuhn said that he no longer saw the humanities as a “useless academic appendage (but) a vital part of the preservation, expansion and transmission of human cultural achievement.” Kuhn co-directs Students Tutoring for Literacy, a KU instruction program for diverse populations learning English as a second language, including students, adults and convicts. He is also an undergraduate teaching assistant for introductory biology and chemistry lab classes. As a junior, he was selected for membership in two national honor societies: Pi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi. Faculty nominating Kuhn described him as an exceptionally outstanding scholar. One nomination letter noted that “faculty members are literally vying with each other to work with (Kuhn)” on his proposal for a graduate seminar research project. He is the son of Daniel Kuhn and is a Concordia High School graduate.

JOHNSON COUNTY
From Leawood 66209

Daniel Patrick Hogan has a double major in physics and mathematics and is a 2007 Barry M. Goldwater Scholar. His goals include earning a doctorate in physics and teaching the next generation of physics students, “in hope of sharing my own love of the subject …” Hogan is also a Black & Veatch National Merit Scholar and Chancellors Club scholar. He is the only undergraduate among the contributing authors for three recently published papers on astrobiology research with KU professor Adrian Melott. Hogan has worked with the KU-based RICE (Radio Ice Cerenkov Experiment) project at the South Pole and with Cornell University’s CLEO high-energy physics lab. As a participant in the 2005 National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates at State University of New York-Stonybrook, he studied magnetic monopoles, a hypothetical particle. Hogan said he will have the good fortune to begin graduate school as “the world’s premier particle accelerator will come online,” referring to the Large Hadron Collider, which will probe deeper into matter than ever before. The LHC is part of the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Switzerland. As an applicant for a Marshall scholarship and a Rhodes scholarship, Hogan seeks to study at either Imperial College in London, Cambridge University or Oxford University, where the physics departments have leading roles in LHC research. At KU, he is president of the campus chapter of the Society of Physics Students and has served as president of the Juggling Club. He is the son of Patrick and Jane Hogan and is a Blue Valley North High School graduate.

From Leawood 66211

Nicholas Cris Barnthouse is majoring in biochemistry and plans to earn a medical degree specializing in oncology or orthopedics. He is “particularly interested in the way that the body reacts to the implantation of foreign objects at the joint interface.” In graduate school, Barnthouse hopes to research the benefits that nanotechnology offers with regard to joint stabilization. At KU, he has worked in the lab of Mark Richter, professor of biological sciences, studying methods to diagnose and treat cancer through the analysis of a newly discovered enzyme. This summer, Barnthouse participated in the NIH Summer Research internship program, where he worked on an investigation by Paul Hwang of the role of this enzyme in colon cancer. Barnthouse also volunteers at the Kansas City Orthopedic Institute. Barnthouse is president of KU’s chapter of Mortar Board and is a member of Phi Kappa Phi. Both are national honor societies. He earned a Summerfield scholarship, KU’s renewable scholarship for men given to 50 top students from Kansas. He also was selected for the University Scholars Program, KU’s mentoring program offered to 20 top sophomores annually. Barnthouse is a tennis instructor. He is the son of Cris and Carrie Barnthouse and is a graduate of Blue Valley North High School.

From Lenexa 66215
Katherine “Kate” Carnaby Sullivan is working this fall as one of 10 fellows selected by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation in Washington, D.C., to focus on national educational policy. As a Fordham fellow, Sullivan works with the Alliance for Excellent Education in Washington. She graduated from KU in spring 2005 with degrees in English, American studies and art history. She joined Teach for America and taught English for two years at Media Academy High School in Oakland, Calif. Each of her senior students passed the California High School Exit Exam. Sullivan plans to pursue a doctorate in public policy to prepare for a career advocating for diversity in public schools and to improve educational equity for disadvantaged children. She has an article in press and another published in “Teaching the Neglected ‘R’: Rethinking Writing Instruction in Secondary Classrooms,” edited by Thomas Newkirk and Richard Kent and published by Heinemann Books. At KU, she was a member of Phi Beta Kappa honor society and was a coordinator for Alternative Breaks, a program matching student volunteers with service projects during semester breaks or weekends. She is the daughter of Daniel and Sarah Sullivan and is a Shawnee Mission Northwest High School graduate.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
From Washington 20015

Cristina Avelina Fernandez is majoring in political science and economics with a career goal of serving in international development as a women’s rights specialist in Latin America. Fernandez is a U.S. citizen who was born and raised in Paraguay and is attending KU through an exchange program with Catholic University in Asuncion. She is financing her college education through scholarships, campus work and paid internships. At KU, she worked as a resident assistant in a campus residence hall for two years. This fall, Fernandez is working on an entrepreneurship research experience with the Kauffman Foundation in Kansas City, Mo. During summer 2006, she completed internships with the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security and the Organization of American States, both in Washington, D.C. Her language skills and performance as an intern earned her a job offer from OAS, but Fernandez choose to complete her degree at KU. She is fluent in Spanish, English, German and French. In 2006, she was nominated to compete for a Truman scholarship and a Pickering fellowship. She is working on an honors thesis about gender mainstreaming at the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington, D.C. Next spring, she and her faculty mentor, Catherine Weaver, assistant professor of political science, plan to write a comparative study of IDB gender mainstream practices. Weaver became Fernandez’s mentor when Fernandez was selected as a sophomore for the University Scholars Program. On her visits home to Asuncion, Fernandez regularly volunteers in a public nursing home and with Tierra Nueva, a Paraguayan rural development advocacy group. She is the daughter of Maria Guzman and Wilfrido Fernandez of Asuncion and a graduate of Goethe Schule High School in Paraguay.

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