Scholars Galore

What a difference a year makes! In 2005, Harvard affiliates earned one Marshall Scholarship and two Rhodes Scholarships. In 2006, those numbers doubled and quadrupled, respectively. Harvard had more Rhodes picks than any other school, including winners from Canada and Zimbabwe. Daniel Wilner, of Kirkland House and Montreal, a philosophy concentrator, will study politics and social policy at Oxford (where all Rhodes Scholars go); Benjamin L. Robinson, of Mather House and Harare, a joint social studies and German concentrator, whose selection was announced later than the other fellows’, will pursue philosophy.

	Daniel Wilner	Joshua Billings
	Casey Cep	Parvinder S. Thiara
	Brad Smith	Ryan R. Thoreson
	Elise Wang
	Daniel J. Hemel	Emily K. Vasiliauskas
Photographs by Kris Snibbe, Stephanie Mitchell, and Justin Ide / Harvard News Office

Harvard’s American Rhodes Scholars are: Joshua Billings, of Leverett House and Cambridge, a joint classics and German concentrator who will study European literature; Casey Cep, of Pforzheimer House and Cordova, Maryland,an English concentrator (and one of this magazine’s Ledecky Undergraduate Fellows) who expects to study theology; Brad Smith ’05, formerly of Leverett House and Knoxville, Tennessee, a government concentrator who plans to obtain an M.Phil. in comparative social policy; chemistry concentrator Parvinder S. Thiara, of Kirkland House and Rochelle, Illinois, who plans to earn master’s degrees in theoretical chemistry and in water science, management, and policy; Ryan R. Thoreson, of Lowell House and Fargo, North Dakota, a joint government and women, gender, and sexuality concentrator, who will earn an M.Phil. in social anthropology; and Elise Wang, of Adams House and Chicago, a joint comparative religion and women, gender, and sexuality concentrator, who plans to pursue an M.Sc. in forced migration, looking at refugee law.

Both new Marshall Scholars are Lowell House residents. Daniel J. Hemel, a social studies concentrator from Scarsdale, New York, will earn an M.Phil. in international relations at Oxford. Emily K. Vasiliauskas, a literature concentrator from Penhook, Virginia, will study criticism and culture at Cambridge University.