By Francine Black, Staff ReporterSIMON MORRISON, 22 years old, was yesterday named the 2004 Rhodes Scholar by Sir Howard Cooke, Governor-General and chairman of the selection committee, in a ceremony at Kings House.
Morrison topped six other finalists who went through hours of interviews and anxiety, waiting on the result.
The committee consisted of five former Rhodes Scholars Professor Trevor Munroe, Professor Stephen Vasciannie, Dr. David McBean, Eleanor Brown, and Peter Goldson, committee secretary .
According to Mr. Goldson, Morrison was selected because "he is obviously a very bright young man. He is a poet, historian, writer and actor. He is a rounded young man."
Morrison said he just did his best and that proved to be good enough. He will begin postgraduate studies in economics and social history at Oxford University, England.
The runners-up, Mikaela Tyson and Katrina Robinson, both students at Princeton University, New Jersey, USA, will move on to the Commonwealth Caribbean Rhodes Scholarship interviews in Barbados on Tuesday.
Each year two of the unsuccessful candidates are short-listed for interviews by the Commonwealth Caribbean Rhodes Scholarship Committee. They compete with other applicants for the Caribbean Rhodes Scholarships that are awarded annually, with a Jamaican being eligible to be awarded one.
Morrison is a final-year student at Macalester College, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA, where he is majoring in English. He pursued summer studies in journalism and philosophy at Brown University, Rhode Island.
He is the founding editor of The Butcher Shop magazine, a community newspaper in St. Paul and features editor of MacWeekly, a student newspaper at his university. Additionally, Morrison is a photo research intern, a writing tutor and volunteer.
A past student of Campion College and Sts. Peter and Paul, St. Andrew, he served for two years as a computer instructor at the Kingston YMCA.
Simon's father, Cecil Dennis Morrison, an attorney-at-law, was the 1974 Rhodes Scholar.
