EDUCATING LEADERS FOR A MORE JUST, HUMANE, AND SUSTAINABLE WORLD
S A N TA C L A R A U N I V E RS I T Y
s
A Tradition of Leadership Since its founding in 1851, Santa Clara University has educated generations of leaders committed to building a better world. Educators, researchers, founders of nonprofits, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, global business leaders, and members of presidential cabinets have been shaped by the tradition of a rigorous and holistic Jesuit, Catholic education that characterizes the Santa Clara experience. Today, this remarkable heritage inspires the Johnson Scholars Program at Santa Clara University. Comprehensive and intellectually challenging, this program prepares graduates to make meaningful contributions toward a more just, humane, and sustainable world. It is designed to cultivate in students the compassionate, intelligent, and empowered leadership that has distinguished a Santa Clara University education for more than 160 years.
Dr. Leilani Miller, biology professor and director of the University Honors Program, collaborates with Johnson Scholars Jon Tuttle and Eoin Lyons. Scholars form close relationships with faculty and staff at the highest levels of the University.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
The Johnson Scholars Program Santa Clara University’s Johnson Scholars Program offers exceptionally talented, high-achieving students an extraordinary opportunity to develop the leadership skills, knowledge, and commitment required to help build a better world. The program is an integral part of a rigorous, honors-level undergraduate education—but with the privileges and challenges associated with joining a distinctive community of scholars. Students selected as Johnson Scholars receive comprehensive merit awards that include full coverage of tuition, room, and board. These awards are renewable annually for up to four years. Students who demonstrate the highest levels of academic ability, motivation, and leadership potential in their application for freshman admission to Santa Clara University will be considered for this prestigious award.
SCU’s Honors Program
Johnson Scholars are invited to participate in Santa Clara’s University Honors Program. By challenging SCU’s most able students to think more analytically and make deeper connections between their classes and the world, the University Honors Program enables them to attain the highest levels of academic achievement. Creative leadership and research opportunities
Johnson Scholars Program Highlights The Johnson Scholars Program offers students the flexibility to explore the intersection of their values and leadership potential. This also allows them the freedom and financial support to make more expansive and visionary life decisions than might otherwise be possible. Highlights of the Santa Clara Johnson Scholars experience include: A community of scholars
SCU provides Johnson Scholars with the opportunity to develop as a leader, build a rich sense of community, and achieve academic excellence. They join a cohort of the University’s top-tier students with unparalleled access to faculty interaction, mentoring, and one-to-one engagement. From the moment they step on campus, scholars receive support and guidance to prepare and qualify for grants and fellowships throughout their college career and beyond.
After Johnson Scholars have completed their second year at Santa Clara, they are eligible to apply for a summer stipend to fund a self-defined leadership experience such as an internship, independent research, or service abroad. Shaping a better world
At Santa Clara, we educate leaders who will have the knowledge, integrity, and desire to go out and do good in the world. Here, students learn to appreciate other perspectives in ways that help them become a contributing member to the global community.
The Johnson Scholars Commitment Johnson Scholars must maintain a 3.5 grade point average throughout their undergraduate career at Santa Clara. Each year, they also write a letter to the program sponsor describing and reflecting on their experience at Santa Clara University and their development as leaders.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Johnson Scholars Criteria The prestigious Santa Clara Johnson Scholars Program is offered to those students whose qualities, experiences, and observable success have prepared them to excel as leaders. Finalists will be selected on the basis of academic achievements, as well as their potential to contribute to the intellectual and civic life of SCU and the world at large. To be considered, candidates should display all of the following characteristics: n
n n
n
Demonstrated record of high academic performance in a rigorous curriculum An unweighted cumulative GPA of 3.8 or better An ACT composite score of 30 or above or an SAT combined score of 1400 in the math and critical reading sections Evidence of leadership and service that permeates the high-school career
Evidence of leadership and service may include: n n
n n n n n n n
n
Local or international cultural immersion participation Directing, stage managing, or designing a theatre production Choreographing a dance production Leadership in student government Starting a club or service organization Leadership in orchestra or choir Responsibility as captain of a team or officer of a club Coordination or organization of tutoring services Organization of an effort that advocates issues of social justice Starting a business or nonprofit enterprise
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
The Award Process Application to Santa Clara Candidates are selected from the early decision, early action, and regular admission application pools. No separate scholarship application is required. Admission applications must be submitted through the online Common Application process (www.commonapp.org). For more information about the scholarship selection process, visit www.scu.edu/johnsonscholars/selection.
Selection Process Semi-finalists will be notified by mid-February and asked to submit an essay by early March. After essays are reviewed, finalists will be invited to a Scholarship Weekend in early April. Travel and lodging expenses for finalists will be paid by the University. The weekend includes attending classes,
touring the campus, meeting with faculty mentors, dining with members of the Johnson Scholars community, selection activities, and additional events. A program for parents, who may attend at their own expense, will intersect and complement the student program.
Scholarship Awards From among the finalists, 10 Johnson Scholars for the academic year will be selected and notified in the weeks following Scholarship Weekend.
The first operating institution of higher education in California, SCU is known for its history, beauty, and distinctive, mission-style architecture. As a member of the Santa Clara community, you will thrive in an environment conducive to learning, reflection, and engagement.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Seven Johnson Scholars visited the Arizona border as part of an immersion trip. The Johnson Scholars program emphasizes experiences outside the classroom setting.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Learning Beyond Campus At Santa Clara University, students are nurtured and challenged—intellectually, spiritually, and socially— to prepare them for a life of leadership and service to the common good. In coordination with the Ignatian Center for Jesuit Education, the Johnson Scholars program organizes national and international immersion experiences into the gritty reality of our globalizing world. As part of the distinctive leadership development approach of the Johnson Scholars program, the Immersion experiences provide the opportunity for scholars to let the reality of this world into their lives, so they can learn to feel it, think about it critically, respond to its suffering, and engage it constructively.
2014-2015 Immersion Experience During spring break in 2014-15, seven Johnson Scholars visited Tucson, Ariz., to study immigration issues through Borderlinks, a nonprofit, education-focused organization and long-standing partner of the Ignatian Center in providing immersion experiences. To see immigration from angles they don’t often find in news reports, the immersion participants met with many groups to learn from the experiences of various perspectives including: n
n
n
n
No More Deaths/No Mas Muertes organization, whose mission is “to end death and suffering in the Mexico-US borderlands through civil initiative” Samaritans, a nonprofit that provides food, water, clothing, and medical care in the desert Sierra Club, which seeks to raise awareness regarding the environmental impacts of government policies at the border Lawyers involved with the criminal-justice and deportation systems.
“I find it very inspiring just to see people living what they believe in,” says Alaina Boyle, a junior Johnson Scholar who is majoring in psychobiology with
Scholars heard from dozens of voices on immigration, including this meeting at the Arizona-Mexico border with a Presbyterian pastor. minors in psychology and philosophy. To Boyle, the most compelling lesson was that each organization focused on providing personalized care and advocacy. They simply chose to make a difference one day at a time, one person at a time. For Boyle and Marli Dunn, now a sophomore Johnson Scholar, the experience was a trip outside their comfort zone. Boyle is from Rocklin, a suburb in Northern California. Dunn is from Avondale, Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix. Comparing the perspectives from their hometowns and what they observed during the trip, each Scholar was challenged through reflections and group discussions to rethink how they might pursue justice in their everyday lives and as future leaders. Dunn, a psychology major, found the trip to be insightful, humbling, and thought-provoking. “I’m definitely keeping my spring break free for another opportunity,” she says.
Marli Dunn, Class of 2018 Johnson Scholar.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Leadership Formation During their four years on campus, Johnson Scholars participate in many leadership development opportunities that align with the University’s commitment to: competence, conscience, compassion. The Honors Program and the Provost’s Office tailor a set of activities specifically for Johnson Scholars to ensure that their experience provides a targeted
In addition to the retreat, other leadership development activities during the 2014-2015 academic year included: n
and well-rounded leadership education.
n
n
Khoi Nguyen Bui, Class of 2017 Johnson Scholar. The benchmark event of each academic year is the Johnson Scholar retreat during the fall quarter. Scholars participate in team-building and leadership formation activities for a weekend. The 2014-15 retreat took place on the Pacific coast near Monterey Bay. Johnson Scholars discussed how they wanted to shape the program for the year and decided that service was a critical component of leadership. The scholars organized a community-service event involving making breakfast at a local homeless shelter. “It was not just how to become a good leader, but what you can do for the community,” commented junior Khoi Nguyen Bui of San José, a biochemistry major and member of the first Johnson Scholars class to enter the University in 2013.
Invitations to lectures and associated student events with the President’s Speaker Series guests, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, TV director and SCU alumnus Andy Ackerman (Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm), and NFL Hall of Famer Ronnie Lott. Readings and reflections of the books Finding Your True North, the 2008 leadership manual by Bill George, and Touch the Top of the World, the 2002 memoir by Erik Weihenmayer, the first blind man to reach the summit of Mount Everest. A Skype discussion with Weihenmayer about leadership and overcoming uncertainty was a highlight of the year. Team exercises with the Center for Student Leadership during the 2015 Johnson Scholarship Weekend.
Faculty-supervised events allow scholars to develop leadership skills both inside and outside the classroom that will help them be effective in their careers, community and personal lives. Scholars are challenged and equipped to grow in their unique leadership styles as well as explore the full spectrum of activities and majors available at Santa Clara. Hannah Warnecke, Class
of 2018 Johnson Scholar. “One of the goals of the program is to help us develop our own leadership style,” says sophomore Hannah Warnecke of Conifer, Colorado. Having completed her first year, Warnecke reflects. “The support system is phenomenal. I would not change anything at all.”
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Students kayak off the coast of Monterey during the annual leadership retreat.
During Scholarship Weekend, prospective students work together on problem-solving and leadership exercises.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
Santa Clara University Our mission is grounded in a 450-year Jesuit tradition of educating the whole person to become a leader of conscience, competence, and compassion. With a strong community-based learning model that distinguishes its undergraduate experience, Santa Clara instills not only the knowledge required to succeed in a complicated world, but also the desire and ability to change it. Santa Clara University is California’s oldest operating university. Known as “the Jesuit University in Silicon Valley,” the University’s reputation is about much more than its location. The spirit of creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship that characterizes the Valley, together with an exceptional work ethic and the willingness to take chances, have been part of the Santa Clara University tradition since well before the start of the digital age.
As a Jesuit, Catholic university, Santa Clara is the optimal choice for students who are seeking an intellectually rigorous, spiritually enriching, leadership focused, and culturally engaging educational experience.
Silicon Valley Location Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, Santa Clara is adjacent to San José, the 10th largest city in the U.S., and about 45 miles south of San Francisco. Home to more than 2 million residents and 6,600 science- and technology-related companies, the region is known for its extraordinary visionaries who have created some of the most significant scientific and technological advances of our age—as well as the many internship and employment opportunities that abound here.
In the heart of Silicon Valley, Santa Clara University is ideally situated at the nexus of technology, innovation, entrepreneurship, and social justice. The powerful high-tech economy emerged alongside our long-established University, and its proximity serves Santa Clara’s best qualities and most exciting opportunities.
Hannah Kortbawi, Class of 2018, makes the most of research opportunities available to undergraduates at SCU.
t h e
j o h n s o n
s c h o l a r s
p r o g r a m
His Holiness the Dalai Lama meets with Johnson Scholars and Honors Program students on campus at SCU.
About SCU/Quick Facts Santa Clara University Founded in 1851 106 acres; private-suburban setting 5,486 undergraduates 3,529 graduate students 530 full-time faculty
Undergraduate Student Body, Fall 2014 Total undergraduate enrollment 5,486 First-year class 1,319 Transfer class 140 Student/faculty ratio 12:1 Average class size 23 First-years who continue to sophomore year 96% Undergraduate 4-year graduation rate 78% Undergraduate 6-year graduation rate 85%
First-year Students, Fall 2014 Applied 14,985 Accepted 7,395 Enrolled 1,319 Living on campus 96% Middle 50% scores (admitted) Academic GPA (4.0 unweighted scale) 3.67 SAT critical reading 590–680 SAT math 620–710 ACT composite 27–32
The Johnson Scholars Class of 2018 enjoys meeting with Rupert and Maryellie Johnson.
The Johnson Scholars Program is about developing ethical leaders, building a rich sense of community, and achieving academic excellence. With the intellect and drive to excel and a natural inclination to care, as a Johnson Scholar you have the opportunity to develop as a leader shaped by a rigorous and holistic Jesuit education at Santa Clara. Engaging talented and committed students who will form the next generation of leaders is essential to our mission. We invite you to bring your passions and perspectives to Santa Clara and further enrich our campus community. The Johnson Scholars Program is funded by a generous gift from Rupert and Maryellie Johnson.
The Jesuit University in Silicon Valley
Amy Shachter, Ph.D. Senior Associate Provost for Research and Faculty Affairs Santa Clara University 500 El Camino Real Santa Clara, CA 95053 408-551-7041
Kelly Uchiumi Senior Administrative Assistant for Johnson Scholars Program Santa Clara University 500 El Camino Real Santa Clara, CA 95053 408-551-3461
ashachter@scu.edu
kuchiumi@scu.edu
www.scu.edu/johnsonscholars
FPO
PROV-8319C 08/15 6,500
For more information please contact: