Senior wins Gates for study in Cambridge

In the world of prestigious scholarships, Penn is back in the game.

As of last Sunday, Alix Rogers is representing Penn as the University's only winner of the Gates Cambridge Scholarship, which grants recipients one year of study and research at the University of Cambridge in England.

Rogers is Penn's 15th Gates winner since the Scholarship was created in 2000.

And though no Penn students received the Rhodes or the Marshall Scholarships this year, there's a reason why this College senior was chosen for the Gates.

Rogers' resume runs the gamut, from president of Penn's Bioethics Society and founder of Penn's Bioethics Journal to equestrian team member to Tri-Delta sister.

But it was Rogers passion for bioethics that put her ahead of the applicants that applied from Penn.

After hearing about the cloned sheep Dolly at a young age, Rogers said she remembered being "fascinated by the new and pressing questions society faced as a whole."

With this award, Rogers, who will graduate with a double major in Health and Societies and Philosophy, will go to Cambridge in October. She will spend nine months there earning a master's in a program known as "the history, philosophy and sociology of science, medicine and technology."

"I'm interested in [using] ethics and public policy to guide scientific" advances, she said.

The scholarship, started from a $210 million endowment given by Bill and Melinda Gates in 2000, is neither as old nor quite as prestigious as the Rhodes or Marshall Scholarships - which no Penn students won this year - but it is certainly as competitive, said Arthur Casciato, the director of Penn's Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships, which provides advising for students interested in pursuing these types of scholarships.

"In terms of competitiveness, it is the third-most difficult to win," Casciato said. "The Gates Scholarship is the Rhodes of the 21st century."

There is no nomination process for the Gates scholarship, unlike the Rhodes or Marshall scholarships, but CURF encourages students to apply and helps them prepare for the interview process.

Roughly 600 students across the country applied for the scholarship; 124 were chosen as finalists, and 40 were awarded the scholarship.

Conversely, this year, the Rhodes awarded 32 scholarships to an applicant pool of 900.

Rogers said she became interested in applying for the scholarship after speaking to Casciato, who "heavily encouraged her to apply."

"The bar is so high. I didn't know how it would turn out," Rogers said. "But for some reason, they like me."

2006 College alumna Amelia Duffy-Tumasz - who applied for the Gates scholarship through CURF after graduating from the University - was named a finalist for the award.

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