Nayab Khan ’08 received the Morehead-Cain Scholarship at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, announced the College Counseling Office this past week. Khan and 81 other winners were chosen out of a pool of 1,500 applicants for “leadership, achievement, moral force of character and physical vigor.” Worth $140,000 for out-of-state applicants, the Morehead-Cain Scholarship covers the cost of four years of undergraduate study, including housing, meals, books, supplies and travel. Recipients also receive a laptop computer, fully funded four-year summer enrichment programs and funding to pursue a gap year before college. Khan’s house counselor Patrick Farrell, Instructor in Mathematics, nominated her for the scholarship for her intensive involvement at Andover. Khan has been a proctor in Johnson Hall for the past two years. She is also the Community Service Coordinator for Center for Global Justice and Co-Head of the Muslim Student Union. After learning of her nomination during upper spring, Khan was interviewed by a Morehead-Cain Foundation official on campus. In March, Khan was named a semi-finalist. She traveled to the UNC campus to meet with the Foundation and have her final interview. The winners were notified on March 5 and announced to the media on March 7. One of the major expectations of being a Morehead-Cain scholar is the attendance of summer enrichment programs offered prior to the start of each school year. The four diverse programs offer instruction in outdoor leadership, public service, international research and private enterprise. In the outdoor leadership program, scholars spend three weeks in wilderness locations across the nation, “pushing themselves to their limits both physically and mentally” while preparing “to take on the challenges of college life and their commitment to UNC with renewed vigor and determination.” During their second summer, the scholars attend Public Service programs, working on community service projects for eight to ten weeks in places such as Latin America, the Far East, Eastern Europe and Africa. The following summer, recipients have opportunities to participate in a travel-study program or an internship. During the summer before their senior year, scholars are offered internships in metropolitan areas such as New York, Chicago and London. John Motley Morehead III established the program, originally named the Morehead Scholarship Program, in 1951. However, the first Morehead Scholars did not graduate until 1957. The foundation was renamed the Morehead-Cain foundation in 2007 after receiving a $100 million gift from the Gordon and Mary Cain Foundation. Prominent alumni of the Morehead-Cain scholarship include Wall Street Journal Assistant Managing Editor Alan Murray, North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper and Sallie Krawcheck, the Chairman and CEO of Citigroup’s Global Wealth Management Unit. Approximately three-quarters of the alumni hold advanced degrees from schools such as Brown, Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Yale and Oxford University; 23 are Rhodes Scholars. Other local recipients of the scholarship include students from Milton Academy, St. George’s School, Lawrenceville and Choate Rosemary Hall.
