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Case and Melville scholarships recognize past achievements and future promise
By Brian Fitzgerald
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At the Case and Melville scholarship awards ceremony: (from left) Case Scholars Kaiwen Leong (CAS’06), Cynthia Swanson (CAS’06), and Harris Phillips (CAS’06), Melville Scholar Maelyn Entwistle (SED ’06), Case Scholars Hanjiang Ji (CAS’06), Diana Nenchev (CAS’06), Deborah Fiore (COM’06), Lauren O’Donnell (CAS’06), and Kaitlin McDonough (CFA’06), Melville Scholar Nina Gluchowski (SAR’06), and Provost David Campbell. Case Scholars not pictured are William Justin Michaels (SMG’06) and Victoria Saccoccio (SAR’06, CAS’06). Photo by Vernon Doucette |
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As a four-year-old, Nina Gluchowski wanted to be a “kiddy doctor” when she grew up. Now a human physiology major enrolled in BU’s Modular Medical Integrated Curriculum (MMEDIC) program, she is well on her way to becoming a pediatrician.
Gluchowski (SAR’06) says that her career choice was clearly influenced by her relationship with her own pediatrician. “I remember that unlike my peers, I was never scared to go to the doctor,” she says. “My doctor always made me feel comfortable and took the time to get to know my family. There are some doctors who treat patients like the symptoms they experience, and others who treat patients like people. My pediatrician always made me feel important and wanted to hear what I had to say.”
Gluchowski is among 12 students recently honored with one of BU’s two highest awards recognizing undergraduate achievement — the Dean Elsbeth Melville Scholarship. The other is the Harold C. Case Scholarship. A ceremony was held for the recipients of both awards on May 8 at The Castle.
Melville Scholars
The Melville Scholarships were established 27 years ago in honor of the late Elsbeth Melville (CAS’25), the longtime dean of women at BU. Each year, it is presented to two junior women who have excellent academic records and high moral character, display potential usefulness in their chosen fields, and contribute to the life of the University.
If Gluchowski had any doubts about her vocation, they were erased after her junior year of high school, when the Mahopac, N.Y., native attended a summer scholar program at the University of Miami. “I was given the opportunity to shadow professionals at three hospitals, and it was during this experience that my passion for the medical field was affirmed,” she says. “I was fascinated by the technology, as well as the dedication of the doctors and nurses, especially in the neonatal intensive care unit at Miami Children’s Hospital.”
She entered SAR’s human physiology program because she wanted to learn about the clinical aspects of health care, and she knew the major would “offer an in-depth understanding of the human body,” she says. “Both are necessary to be a successful health-care provider.”
Gluchowski “is not only an accomplished student, but an involved one,” says Provost David Campbell. She is a Sargent College peer counselor, works as a dean’s host, tutors biology and chemistry at the Educational Resource Center, and is a volunteer at the Community Service Center. This year Gluchowski was selected to be the undergraduate representative on two Sargent College committees: the Committee on Academic Policies and Procedures and the Undergraduate Education Committee. “She is an ardent and caring human being whose passion for medicine is clearly a passion for helping others in all ways,” states one of her faculty recommendations. “The way Nina lives her life as a student is completely consonant with her career path.”
This year’s other Melville Scholar is Maelyn Entwistle (SED’06), a deaf studies major whose academic interest has connected her to activities that include volunteering at the Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in Allston and working in BU’s Disability Services office. She has also served as captain and secretary of the BU Mock Trial organization, been a member of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars, and worked as a School of Education peer advisor. At present, she is an undergraduate research assistant in the Child Cognition Lab, testing children and working with statistical data.
Case Scholars
The Harold C. Case Scholarships, honoring the University’s fifth president (1950-1967), were established in 1967. The tenure of Case (GRS’27) marked BU’s transformation from a commuter school to a university where the majority of students live on or near the campus. Each year the scholarships are awarded to at least 10 juniors who exhibit great scholarly accomplishment and potential, as well as participate in extracurricular activities that contribute to University life.
This summer, Case Scholar Cynthia Swanson (CAS’06) will spend seven weeks in Rome and the Bay of Naples, but the trip is not an extended vacation. She is taking a Brown University summer course called Rome Art, Archaeology, and Civic Life from the End of the Republic through the Early Empire.
Swanson, who is majoring in ancient Greek and Latin as well as English, bristles at critics who suggest that the study of a “dead” language is impractical — an opinion that arises often among her peers. “I point out that while there is nowhere in the world that someone can speak Latin among native Latin speakers, there is nowhere in the Western world where one can not encounter Latin in some form or another,” she says. “Ancient Rome’s language, literature, and civic institutions are lurking everywhere, if you only have eyes to see them. Studying Latin gives you those eyes and also gives you a sense of where at least part of your own culture has come from. Moreover, studying Latin, just as studying any other of the liberal arts, helps with your ability to think and read and write, which are the most important intellectual skills anyone can gain.”
Swanson is also a Trustee Scholar, a member of the Golden Key National Honor Society, and an Alice M. Brennan Humanities Fellow. She is active in several clubs, including the Undergraduate Classics Association, is an overnight host for the Office of Admissions, and hosts the WTBU radio show Cynth Rock.
The other Case Scholars are communications major Deborah Fiore (COM’06); economics and computer science major Hanjiang Ji (CAS’06); Kaiwen Leong (CAS’06), who is majoring in economics and mathematics; painting and art education major Kaitlin McDonough (CFA’06); philosophy and psychology major Diana Nenchev (CAS’06); political science major Lauren O’Donnell (CAS’06); business administration major William Michaels (SMG’06); mathematics major Harris Phillips (CAS’06); and Victoria Saccoccio (SAR’06, CAS’06), who is majoring in nutritional sciences and biology.
19
May 2005
Boston University
Office of University Relations