February 2007

Shapiro, Bender Scholarships Open Doors to England’s Famed Oxford and Cambridge Universities

By Zak M. Salih

Oxford and Cambridge, with their deep historical roots, are the two oldest academic institutions in the English-speaking world. The opportunity to study at these distinguished universities is available to GW students through the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Scholarship and the Dorothy G. Bender Scholarship. Early in his administration at GW, President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg conceived the idea for these scholarships and sought out benefactors to underwrite them.

“The idea behind the Shapiro and Bender awards was that the University would have its own resources to help give highly qualified students the opportunity to study at Oxford and Cambridge,” says Francis DuVinage, director of GW’s Center for Undergraduate Fellowships and Research.

The Shapiro Scholarship, established in 1990, is funded by an endowment from the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Charitable Trust. The Bender Scholarship, endowed by the Dorothy G. Bender Foundation Inc. since 1992, provides similar financial opportunities for students interested in studying at Cambridge. While the programs are patterned after the prestigious and highly competitive Rhodes and Marshall scholarships, they are limited to GW students.

The Bender and Shapiro scholarships, each awarded annually to one student, provide full tuition and fees for up to two years, along with an allowance for room, board, personal expenses, books, and travel between England and Washington, D.C. According to DuVinage, many Shapiro and Bender scholars have been finalists or semifinalists for Rhodes and Marshall scholarships.

“I would never have had the opportunity to study at Oxford without the Shapiro Scholarship,” says Donald Goodson, B.A. ’05, a Rhodes Scholarship finalist who is currently earning master’s degrees in both African studies and politics and international relations research at Oxford’s St. Antony’s College. “Given my family’s financial circumstances, I would never have been able to afford the costs of attending without a full scholarship.”

Liza Blake, B.A. ’06, says the Bender Scholarship has made furthering her education at Cambridge possible. Now studying Renaissance literature at Cambridge for a master’s degree, she considers the scholarship “a pretty great deal, a year here would have been unaffordable otherwise.”

Spending time at these two universities has had a profound effect on the recipients. For Ozan Jaquette, B.A. ’01, earning his M.Phil in comparative social policy from Wolfson College at Oxford provided a life-altering academic experience.

“I was so engaged with what I was learning,” says Jaquette, a 2003 Shapiro winner. “I have never been around a community that intellectually stimulating.”
“Oxford was the best two years of my life,” says Leah Acosta, B.A. ’01. From 2001 to 2003, she was a student at Hertford College studying for a second bachelor’s degree in psychology, philosophy, and physiology to connect her psychology degree from GW with her intended future career in medicine.
“It was a tremendous honor to represent GW,” she recalls. “I feel that our students hold their own with all the other scholars at Oxford.”

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