After eight years as the John Carroll Scholars, Georgetown’s leading fellowship and research program is changing its name.
From now on the organization will be known as the Carroll Fellows Initiative. Despite the new name and other alterations, however, administrators say their stated mission of developing the life of the mind for the life of the world remains the same.
“We’re just changing the way we help students go about dealing with the program’s expectations,” program director John Glavin said.
But some Carroll Fellows complain that the program has gone through too many changes recently. “I don’t really know what JCS is anymore,” a junior Carroll Fellow said. She declined to be named, fearing the response of program administrators.
One such change is the new contract for returning Fellows, which binds them to such program requirements as academic integrity, a research assistantship and participation in small Fellow-led classes known as Clusters.
Some Fellows find the contract insulting. “The fact that they have requirements is like they’re treating you like you’re in elementary school,” the junior Fellow said. “You’d expect that in college people would trust you.”
Administrators say the requirements are nothing new. “The contract is something that we’ve done in the past, but it’s a little more detailed,” Associate Director Carolyn Emigh said.
In another alteration, students are no longer accepted during the regular admissions process. Now they must attend information sessions on campus before applying partway through the school year.
“You can really get a sense of what we do and whether that matches what you want to do,” Glavin said.
Since the first class of John Carroll Scholars graduated in 2001, the program has produced two Gates Scholars, three Jack Kent Cooke Scholars and two Mitchell Scholars. Of eight Georgetown students in competition for the Rhodes Scholarship this year, four are Carroll Fellows, Glavin said. Glavin also serves as secretary for Georgetown’s fellowship selection committee.
Some Fellows complain that grooming students for post-graduate fellowships like the Rhodes is the only thing the program is interested in. “They seem to care mostly about the prestige we can bring to them and to the university,” a senior Carroll Fellow, who also declined to provide a name, said.
So far, however, the program has yet to see a Rhodes Scholar in its ranks. Last year’s Rhodes recipient Jennifer Howitt (SFS ‘05), the 22nd Rhodes Scholar Georgetown has produced, was not part of the John Carroll Program, nor was 2003 recipient Anthony House (CAS ‘02).
Tetyana Gaponenko (SFS ‘07), however, has found the program’s commitment to leadership and research helpful. “It really helped me see what education is about and to be more specific with what I want to do,” Gaponenko said.
Despite her complaints, the senior Fellow agreed that in the end, joining the John Carroll Program was a good decision. “I feel like over all it’s been a pretty positive experience,” she said. “The program is really what you make of it.”
The program’s Blackboard site currently boasts 271 members drawn from all four years at Georgetown.
