FAYETTEVILLE -- Six incoming freshmen will receive $70,000 Bodenhamer Fellowships to attend the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.
The awards, established in 1998, are among the top in value offered by UA and also include a five-day trip this summer to New York City funded by Lee Bodenhamer, a retired Little Rock businessman and UA graduate who established the awards. In addition to typical college costs, award money can be spent to study abroad, attend academic conferences and pay for research equipment.
To be eligible, students must score at least a 32 on the ACT college entrance exam and have a high school grade-point average of 3.8 or higher, with extracurricular activities and community service among the selection criteria.
This year's fellows are: Anna Fisher, Mountain Home High School; Hannah Gray, eStem High Public Charter School in Little Rock; Samuel Lipson, Haas Hall Academy in Fayetteville; Andrew Palmer, Bentonville High School; Grace Roberts, Houston High School in Germantown, Tenn.; and Savannah Seupaul, Little Rock Central High School.
Award winners were chosen from a pool of 896 applicants seeking Bodenhamer or other fellowships offered by UA, said Samantha Kirby, a UA spokesman.
Beginning in fall 2013, the value of the four-year award increased from $50,000. UA offers "up to 90" new awards of $70,000 over four years given out yearly by the university's Honors College, according to the university.
Stephen Burd, a senior policy analyst for the nonpartisan public policy group New America, said such high-dollar awards are "not totally unusual among the public flagships" as they recruit top students.
"What you find is these universities have to just kind of continually up the ante in terms of convincing students to come," Burd said.
Metro on 06/13/2017