Editors: Ross will be available for interviews from Dec. 28 through Jan. 6.
Bertrall LeNarado Ross, who rose from poverty and a broken home to become an honors student at the University of Colorado at Boulder, has won a prestigious British Marshall Scholarship that will sponsor several years of advanced studies at a university in the United Kingdom.
One of only 40 students in the United States to receive the scholarship this year, Ross adds it to an impressive array of academic achievement that includes a $30,000 Woodrow Wilson Fellowship for graduate study, summa cum laude and dean聮s list designations, membership in Phi Beta Kappa and the presidency of Sigma Iota Rho, the International Affairs Honor Society. He is a senior at CU-Boulder and plans to graduate next May.
Ross is the fourth CU student to win a Marshall. Judith Holleman, now a professor in Georgia, won in 1961 and studied at the London School of Economics. In 1962, Julia Haig Gaisser used her Marshall to attend the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, and in 1971, Betti J. Rockwell took a Marshall for work at the University of London聮s School of Soviet and East European Studies.
In his application, Ross wrote that he received the greatest compliment of his life when a high school counselor in 1993 described him as "a survivor." That comment ignited an inner fire that "made me see myself in a new light, transforming my past from one that seemed impossible to overcome into a set of experiences that I could gain strength from. I entered my 10th school in 12 years on that snowy January day in Chicago with a renewed determination to conquer the demons of my past and to face the future with hope."
Ross, 22, was born in Gardena, Calif., and raised by his grandmother, who moved frequently in search of better jobs and housing. "Each year brought a new school, new peer, and a new life," he wrote, and a return to his parents failed. Although he was fascinated by maps in the World Book Atlas and encyclopedia articles, his turbulent childhood led counselors to steer him toward vocational education, and his dreams of college faded.
Counting on his grandmother as a "source of comfort that everything would turn out okay," Ross found no allure from street gangs. The one time that he did stray, "ditching school and doing the wrong thing," he quickly realized he had made a bad choice and "attained a new set of friends."
Ross said his grandmother "made me strong as a person and gave me a firm and stable character," but it was an aunt who inspired him scholastically as she worked her way through graduate school while raising two children. "Her travails inspired me to attain a belief in my academic self," he recalled.
And his own insatiable curiosity drew him to read biographies of great leaders such as Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Robert F. Kennedy, where Ross found the courage to stand up for his own rights. He won a court order for legal emancipation from his parents, moved in with a friend and plunged into scholarship. He earned a 4.0 grade-point average in his senior year of high school and entered the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1994, working some 25 hours a week to pay for his university education, which was completely self-funded.
In his first three years, Ross maintained a 3.81 grade-point average in a double major of international affairs and history, and says he was particularly inspired by two professors in the CU-Boulder history department, Robert Pois, "a passionate teacher," and Fred Anderson, "who drove me to excel." His senior honors thesis on the legacies of British indirect rule in Nigeria won a summa cum laude designation and set him on a career to promote the welfare of developing nations.
Tom Zeiler, a professor of history at CU, lists Ross among the top five students he has taught and said Ross usually sits quietly in a class, absorbing every word and then makes an "incredibly intelligent statement." Zeiler said Ross "is committed to trying to create some fairness and justice between the rich and poor nations of the world."
"I believe I can make a difference," said Ross. "I just don聮t know how yet."
Helen Mann, of the British consulate in Houston, said she was impressed with Ross聮 composure during the interview for the scholarship. His defined area of interest is how Britain聮s colonial policies still have an impact on the African nations that once were part of the Empire.
"He had to sit across from the British consul and tell him the British had not done such a good job," Mann recalled. "He was shaking like a leaf when it was over," not realizing that everyone in the room admired his determination, she said. "It caused quite a stir," Ross remembered. "When I walked out of there, I thought it was all over."
Ross will study at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies, allowing him "unparalleled access to the records of colonial administration" and to historians of both the British Empire and African nations. His goal is to eventually obtain a doctorate in international affairs and become a policy-maker for the World Bank, the U.N. Development Programme or a non-governmental organization that deals with development.
Ross currently "is in progress but not in residence" at the University of Colorado, said one university official. He is doing volunteer work in a Chicago homeless shelter, taking a break from formal schooling to examine underdevelopment, in his words, "from the perspective of an inner city in the world聮s richest country."
While in school, Ross worked as a student assistant in Norlin Library, the political science department and the Institute of Behavioral Sciences, and was a volunteer with United Way. After winning a Distinguished Student Award, that allowed him to visit 10 foreign countries, Ross participated in 麻豆淫院 in Service, conducting projects involving orphanages and childrens聮 hospitals in India, Vietnam, Turkey and Morocco.
The Marshall Scholarship, founded in 1953, differs from the Rhodes Scholarship primarily through locations available to the scholar. The Rhodes, created in 1903 by the will of British colonial statesman Cecil Rhodes, limits studies to Oxford University. A Marshall recipient can study at any British university. The total value of the scholarship varies according to circumstances, but averages about $25,000 a year, including tuition, travel and living expenses.
Parliament established the British Marshall Scholarships Program in 1953 in honor of former U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall, in gratitude for the economic assistance received through the Marshall Plan after World War II. Funded by the British government, it is the largest single program for Americans studying in Britain and among the most prestigious.
Marshall championed a "close accord" between the United States and Great Britain, and one of the scholarship聮s aims is to "provide America聮s future leaders and opinion makers with the opportunity to study in Britain," and allow outstanding students to gain an understanding of British social and economic values.
More than a thousand Marshall Scholarships have been awarded. Among the recipients have been Justice Stephen Breyer of the U.S. Surpreme Court and Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbit. About 800 students apply each year.