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| Vol. 17, No. 20 | Feb. 19, 1998 |
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| Vol. 17, No. 20 | Feb. 19, 1998 |
Douglas Mauro de Lorenzo of North East, Md., who last month became the University of Delaware's ninth Rhodes Scholar, has been selected for USA Today's 1998 All-USA College Academic First Team. He is one of just 20 students chosen for the honor from 1,194 applicants from across the country.
De Lorenzo is a Dean's Scholar in the College of Arts and Science. In three years at the University, he has completed the requirements for a bachelor's degree in cognitive science at the same time he has completed a master's degree in linguistics.
He also completed his high school education at Archmere Academy in three years and was offered a DuPont Scholarship to study at UD when he was a high school junior. He deferred the scholarship for a year in favor of a Congressional Scholarship, which enabled him to study in Germany as an exchange student.
While working toward his degrees at UD, de Lorenzo took time off for travel. He did migration research in Vienna, which led to a more extensive job registering Bosnian refugees to vote in Turkey, Serbia, Slovakia, Croatia and Sarajevo.
He returned to UD and, months later, was asked to fly to Switzerland to deliver a report on the voting process. While there, he was asked to join the U.S. State Department on a similar mission to Liberia. He deferred to return to his studies, but agreed to go to Liberia some months later when the State Department called him again.
De Lorenzo has lived with monks in the Swiss Alps and has learned to speak nine languages.
This summer, he and UD sophomore David Kovara will do volunteer work in an AIDS orphanage in Kenya. In the fall, he will enter Oxford as one of the first students to enroll in its new program in refugee studies. Members of the Academic First Team each received a $2,500 cash award at a special luncheon.
-Beth Thomas
Photo by Robert Cohen
