Nicole Robinson

The casual setting seemed slightly awkward for senior Chauncy Harris, Jr., 23, as he waited patiently in a small room at Lawrence University in Appleton with 11 other Rhodes Scholar candidates.

As he spoke with the candidates, Harris soon realized he was standing among students from Brown, Cornell, Harvard, Princeton, Cornell Universities. Some seemed nervous, some appeared relaxed and some tried to appear intellectual on the surface, he said.

Harris, a history and geography double major, said he decided to be himself – and it worked.

“The most important thing about the whole process is just to be yourself,” he said. “(The Rhodes Scholarship) is an investment in individuals.”

After a three-and-a-half month process, Harris emerged as one of 32 individuals chosen as 2005 Rhodes Scholars. He is the first student from UW-Eau Claire to be selected.

“I felt good about (winning the scholarship),” Harris said. “I just had a really positive attitude, because I generally do in life. It was a good feeling.”

Each Rhodes Scholar must have high academic achievement, an honest character, leadership potential, unselfish behavior, respect for others and a physical energy, all criteria left in Cecil Rhodes’ will.

Harris works 25 to 30 hours a week, carries an average credit load of 23, maintains a 4.0 GPA, is the president of three honor societies and participates in community service work and church groups. After his freshman year at Eau Claire, he took two years off to do missionary work in Italy. He will graduate in August 2005 after spending three years at the university.

“Chauncy really does more than about any other student that I’ve ever seen,” history department chair Thomas Miller said. “He really does excel.”

Junior Peter Chang, a friend, said he has seen firsthand how well Chauncy can manage his time.

“He really budgets every single hour of his time,” Chang said. “It’s quite amazing what he does. I think it’s just willpower.”

The scholarship provides recipients with two or three years of study at Oxford University in England. It also pays for each recipient’s college and university fees and gives a stipend for residence expenses in Oxford and for vacations and transportation to and from England. It is valued at $35,000 per year.

For Harris, the scholarship has been a part of his family for generations, he said. His great-uncle, also named Chauncy Harris, won the award in 1934 and urged Harris to apply for it before he died in December of 2003.

“It was pretty much one of his dying wishes and just something I pretty much had to do,” he said.

The process Harris endured was extensive. It required eight letters of recommendation, a personal statement, a list of relevant activities with references, an endorsement from the university and a letter of recommendation from Chancellor Donald Mash. After that, 10 to 12 applicants were chosen for the state-level competition. That was only the beginning, though.

Next, Harris moved on to the state-level interviews with 10 former Rhodes Scholars. Only two applicants were selected after hours of extensive interviews, Harris said.

The top two then advanced to the district level, which took Harris to Chicago to compete against applicants from throughout the region. On Nov. 20, Harris was one of the four applicants selected for the scholarship in the Midwest.

“At the district level, the competition is incredible,” Harris said. “You have three kids from Harvard, kids from Yale, Stanford, MIT, Cal Tech, University of Chicago, Michigan State, Kenyon College, Cornell University and Eau Claire. You don’t generally have those all in the same sentence.”

Harris will attend Oxford in October 2005, and plans to study Arabic and Modern Middle Eastern Studies. He also plans to earn his doctorate to become a fourth-generation Ph. D.

Chancellor Mash said having a Rhodes Scholar at Eau Claire will help increase the school’s already strong reputation.

“Very few Rhodes Scholars ever come from a regional public university,” Chancellor Donald Mash said. “It also is a real feather in the cap of our campus.”

One of the greatest benefits of being a Rhodes Scholar, Harris said, is the network of people he will meet during the process.

“The Rhodes Scholarship is a wonderful opportunity to advance my academic career,” he said. “It’s going to open a lot of doors for me.”