Jacqueline Soltys, Cornell fellowships coordinator, welcomes participants to a Prestigious Fellowships Reception in Anabel Taylor Hall on Monday. The 1996-97 fellowship winners and applicants from each college were introduced, and Professor Peter Stein, dean of the faculty, thanked faculty members for their involvement. Denise Weldon/University Photography
Jacqueline Soltys is enthusiastic about her job -- and many student scholars are the better for it.
Soltys has been fellowships coordinator for Cornell Career Services for almost a year and a half, and her influence is evident in the remarkable success Cornell has had this year in producing prestigious fellowship winners -- one Truman, one Churchill, one Beinecke, one Keasbey, one Mellon, two Rhodes, three Goldwater and three Marshall scholarships.
In all, 29 Cornell students and recent graduates applied in nine different prestigious national competitions -- resulting in 13 awards, four finalists and one alternate.
And while the lion's share of credit goes to the student winners themselves, credit also is due to those who helped provide inspiration, direction and coaching -- Cornell faculty members, administrators and, notably, Soltys.
"I couldn't have asked for a better year," she said this week.
A native of Boston who grew up Chapel Hill, N.C., Soltys came to Cornell in January 1996 from the faculty of Wells College, where she headed the Russian language program. She earned her B.A. at Wesleyan University and her Ph.D. at Yale.
"What attracted me specifically to this job was it contains a lot of the things I loved about the work I had done in the past -- all in one position," Soltys said. Those components include working with faculty and students, helping students achieve their goals, advising, coaching and doing creative work (including building the program's Web site).
"I get to talk to people and cook up new ideas; and I get to know a great university -- so it's a lot of exciting things rolled into one," she said.
The fellowships office in Barnes Hall has a small staff -- Soltys and staff assistant Raia Murphy, who works at 70 percent for fellowships and 30 percent in support of the Arts and Sciences Career Office. Until a few days ago, when her position was made permanent, Soltys also worked at 70 percent for fellowships and 30 percent in career advising for Arts and Sciences.
So why has the prestigious fellowships effort this year been so successful?
Since she arrived, Soltys has made a concerted effort to "get the word out" about the fellowships, she said, through a variety of means, particularly by including many more faculty in the process.
"I think that's contributed to our students' success," Soltys said. "And it has also raised the interest and awareness level of faculty across campus, just by word of mouth.
"You hear lots of stories about how hard it is to get faculty involved, so I really expected that to be a tough thing -- but I've been amazed at how easy it has been," she said. "They've really been so generous with their time and invested a lot in these students."
This past year, there also was a smaller than usual number of scholarship applicants, which allowed Soltys to give each applicant more individual attention.
"I think that made a tremendous difference, as well," she said.
The prestigious fellowships process begins in the spring, when a letter goes out from the president's office to all juniors above a certain GPA, inviting them to an information session led by Soltys. Other students are identified by faculty members who know about the awards and have students who they feel will be strong candidates.
"I think that's the most effective way to identify the right kind of candidates," Soltys said. "GPA can tell you a certain amount about a person, but you really need a faculty person who has 20 years of seeing students, who sees this kid come along and says, 'this is the right kind of person,' and then either passes their name to me or encourages them to come talk to me."
For prestigious fellowships such as the Rhodes and Marshall scholarships, the process for students is a bit like a marathon, with Soltys and many on the faculty acting as coaches and support staff along the way.
"Once they make the commitment to a specific award, then it becomes a matter of working with them individually to tailor their particular strengths to the demands of that particular award," Soltys said.
In the fall, students interested in prestigious fellowships submit application materials to the University Endorsement Selection Committees, composed largely of faculty.
"Potentially good candidates are encouraged to apply for endorsement," Soltys said, "and the endorsement committee makes the decision about which are the right kind of kids to represent Cornell at the national level."
After the selections are made, the committee, along with Soltys, works with nominees on improving their written materials for final submission to the national fellowship committees.
Candidates for Rhodes and Marshall scholarships are informed in November if they have been chosen for interviews in their home states or regions, and they are prepared for those interviews, both individually and in larger workshops, by Soltys and others.
Rhodes and Marshall winners are announced in early December, and other prestigious fellowship award winners are named during the following semester.
Cornell had a bumper crop in 1997.
"The particular group of students this year -- they're just wonderful people," Soltys said earlier this week. "I've really enjoyed working with them, and I'm going to miss them.
"The other great thing about this job is, you know that even if a kid doesn't make it to the first Rhodes interview, they're so talented that they're going to go off and do something fantastic next year anyway," she said. "So, it's not like you feel bad for the ones who didn't win -- they're all tremendously talented, so nobody loses."
For more information about fellowships opportunities, call the fellowships program office at 255-5221 or visit the program's Web site at www.career.cornell.edu/ccs/Graduate_School/Fellowships/entrypage.html .