Swimmers are no strangers to the Rhodes Scholarship program, one of the most elite and recognized academic honors in the world. Big names like Annette Salmeen, the 1996 NCAA Champion in the 200 fly for UCLA and Olympic gold medalist; Auburn swimmer Jordan Anderson, who in 2009 became the school’s first Rhodes Scholar in 30 years; and Arizona All-American Justine Schluntz, the 2010 NCAA Woman of the Year.
The latest to earn this award is John’s Hopkins co-captain Eleanor Gardner. She is a native of Bermuda and was awarded the one honor allocated to her country this year.
This award will provide Gardner with a full scholarship for two-to-three years of study at the famed Oxford University in the UK, including living costs. There are only 82 awards given around the world each year in the program that has been around since 1902, and all are given in the English-speaking world. Americans are allocated the biggest portion of those with 32.
Gardner is a political science and philosophy major who has focused her academic career on studying the racial tensions in Baltimore, where John’s Hopkins is located, and her native Berduda.
“Immersing myself in the racially charged city of Baltimore heightened my awareness of social issues in the community where I grew up,” Gardner wrote in a project-study of a local park. “Examining the politics of race in Hampden through the academic lens of political science enabled me to reflect on related issues that I had grappled with as a youth in Bermuda. I am also motivated by the desire to reinvest my academic experiences in Bermuda, the community that has inspired my studies.”
Gardner is a freestyle specialist, having been a 1:54.8 in the 200 free, which ranks her 31st in the country in division III this year.