UW-Madison News (December 4, 2009) — One of the top national awards in higher education goes to a student who combines the “rigor of the scientist… and the communication skills of the humanist… with the imagination common to all great thinkers, whatever the field,” says nominator William Berg, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor emeritus of French.
Erin Conrad, originally from Eden Prairie, Minn., is one of 35 Marshall Scholars selected from across the country to act as ambassadors for U.S.-British relations during graduate study in the United Kingdom. The awards, on par with the Rhodes Scholarships, provide talented American students with up to three years of study at a British university of their choice. Conrad is UW-Madison’s first Marshall scholar in 10 years.
Nominator Robert Wilson, professor emeritus of mathematics, says that Conrad’s ability to connect seemingly unrelated ideas “is the kind of thinking that makes breakthroughs, develops significant insights and really advances knowledge on a broad front.”