Dean's Scholars On-Line Application


Full Name:

Social Security Number:

Date of Birth:

Postal Address:

City, State, and Zip:

Phone:

High School:

Most Recent Class Rank:
out of

Date of Ranking:

SAT scores: Highest total at single testing:

Verbal score (for that testing):

Mathematical score (for that testing):

Expected major(s):

1. List each school or community activity in which you have been involved during the last three years in order of their importance to you. Include your period of involvement and any positions you have held. Please list no more than ten.

2. List part-time or summer jobs, volunteer positions, or internships you have held during the last three years in order of their importance to you. Include your position, period of involvement, and hours per week. Please list no more than four.

3. List in order of their importance to you any significant honors and scholarships received during the last three years. Include the award sponsor, basis for the award (e.g. leadership, scholarship, need, etc.), and date received.

4. Identify your educational and career goals.


Note: Each of the following essay questions require a one-page response. On-line composition of these essays is not recommended. There are two options for electronic submission of the essays:

  1. Compose the essays on a word processor, then paste them into the appropriate text boxes on the on-line application.
  2. Alternatively, you may write the essays using a word processor and send them to us via email. If you choose this option, be sure to send your essays in ASCII (plain text) format.

Essay 1: Describe an idea you accepted at some time in your life but later rejected on the basis of a rational process. The notion of Santa Claus might be such an idea but remember that the rejection had to have been based on rationality rejection based upon simply accepting someone's word is not appropriate for this essay. You should describe the idea itself, why you once accepted the idea, and then, most importantly, the rational process that led you to reject it. Finally, for this purpose, you may interpret "rejected" in a weak sense. Thus, if you rejected the notion "eating spinach makes me strong," it is not necessary for you to have come to the conclusion that "eating spinach does not make me strong." It would be sufficient for you to have concluded, "I have insufficient information to know if spinach does or does not make me strong." Please consider your topic carefully. Although the Santa Claus example is used for illustration, a good essay will used a more serious idea and one rejected more recently in your life.

Essay 2: Describe an incident in which you failed at something important to you. Why did you consider it a failure? How did you deal with it?

Essay 3: Belief systems, be they scientific, cultural, political, ethical, or otherwise, are built upon axioms and evidence. When the evidence is in opposition with the axioms, conflict may arise within the system. For example, prior to 200 BC, Aristarchus of Samos and Erasothenes of Cyrene had made not only observations of a sun-centered planetary model and a spherical earth rotating daily on its axis, but also measurements of the sizes of the earth, moon, and sun and the distances between them. These ideas were rejected by the Greeks not on the basis of faulty observation, but simply because they accepted the popular Eudoxian system and ""...found it difficult to rid themselves of the conception that the earth and heavens were entirely different in regard both to their material constitutions, and to the laws they obeyed. Such a [Eudoxian] conception entailed the view that the base earth was stationary at the center of the universe, whilst the more perfect heavenly bodies moved uniformly through the purer regions above."*" Thus the reaction was to deny the evidence. The modern scientific approach, however, requires that axioms must give way to incontrovertible evidence. Discuss (including examples) to what extent you believe the scientific approach should apply in such conflicts between axioms and evidence in belief systems other than scientific.

* Stephen F. Mason, A History of the Sciences, New York, 1962.