Aaron Mertz, a 2006 Washington University alumnus, and Leana Wen, a fourth year medical student in the Washington University School of Medicine, were named Rhodes Scholars this past Saturday. They were two of 32 students from around the U.S. to receive this honor.
Both Mertz and Wen will receive an all-expenses paid two-year education at Oxford University in England, where they will join approximately 80 Rhodes Scholars from around the world when they begin their studies in fall 2007.
Wen, born in Shanghai, China, enrolled in California State University, Los Angeles when she was only 13-years-old. She graduated summa cum laude with a degree in biochemistry in 2001 at the age of 18. Wen left medical school temporarily when serving a one-year term as the national president of the American Medical Student Association (AMSA) in Reston, Va., which is the largest national organization for physicians-in-training.
She was recently chosen by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services to be a member of the Council on Graduate Medical Education, which advises Congress on issues such as medical education. She has also won several national awards and choreographs for a dance group.
Mertz also has a myriad of accomplishments. In his time at the University as a Physics and an American Culture Studies major, he was a two-term president of the Arts & Sciences Council, a representative of the Board of Trustees, and the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Apex, a journal of undergraduate scholarship. He has interned at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in N.M. and the Gamma-Ray Astronomy Group at the Max-Planck-Institut fÂr Extraterrestrische Physik in Germany.
Mertz was also the recipient of several national scholarships, including the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship, and the Lucent Global Science Scholarship, as well as several University accolades including the Arthur Holly Compton Fellowship, and the Ethan A. H. Shepley Award.
Mertz decided to apply because of his standing as a Rhodes Finalist last year and his wish to study at Oxford.]
“I applied last year, [and] I was a finalist. I was told later by some of the committee members that I was really close and that I should consider applying again next year. I completely put it out of my mind for six months and figured out where I would be going to graduate school. I realized that I would still go to Oxford with my educational plan and so I decided to go at it again,” he said.
He added he was “looking at ways of broadening my physics education and I was really interested in studying the history of science.and Oxford has an outstanding History of Science, Medicine, and Technology department.”
Wen could not be reached for comment.
To receive this world-renowned honor, Mertz and Wen had to endure rounds of revisions and interview workshops.
Dean Ian MacMullen, assistant dean and academic coordinator in the College of Arts & Sciences, was the primary person who helped Wen and Mertz with their applications.
There is no limit to the number of nominees that can be chosen, but MacMullen said that the University sends its strongest applicants so that it can garnish its reputation as an institution that only sends the best.
He explained that the process starts in early spring with meetings to inform students about the opportunity. Students have to be nominated by a University faculty committee. MacMullen and the faculty committee then help students polish their application and, if they progress to the final round, practice for their interview where about half a dozen former Rhodes Scholars pummel finalists with questions.
“The interview is just 25 minutes but they cover every range of topic imaginable. They took some things from my application and asked how they apply in current politics or current events or ways they can better society,” Mertz said. “They really tried to get me to think broadly about the issues that I was most passionate about in my application.”
MacMullen said that Mertz and Wen stood out in several ways that made them great candidates for the program.
“[They] applied last year as well. They got started in the spring of 2005 and applied fall of 2005. Both interviewed but didn’t win. They both reapplied the following year,” he said, adding that Mertz and Wen represented the well rounded student in “all around excellence.”
“Rhodes Scholarships are set up on the basis of the will of Cecil Rhodes who laid down basic criteria for what he wanted Rhode Scholars to have,” MacMullen said. Rhodes built his fortune from mining diamonds in Africa and set up the scholarship in 1902.
Mertz is thrilled about this honor. After his two years at Oxford, he will return to get his Ph.D at Yale. But Mertz will not forget about Washington University as he looks towards the future.
“The great training and mentoring I received at Washington University from my professors and other people were invaluable in pursuing this scholarship,” he said.