Celebrating the Freshman Experience of ACES James Scholar Women
Photo of Carol Andreae Haynes, taken circa 1910. This young lady grew up to become the first woman on her family tree to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. (Photo Credit: Haynes Family Archives)
The ACES James Scholar Honors Program is plased to announce the sixth annual Carol Andreae Haynes Sophomore Achievement Awad competition. Each autumn, sophomore ACES James Scholar women are encouraged to share their freshman year experiences in writing by submitting essays detailing the most valuable things that they learned during their first year on the Urbana campus. This year's submission deadline was Monday, November 2 @ 5:00 PM. The Selection Committee conclaved on Friday, November 20 to review all entries and choose a winner. She will be identified on this web page in early December, after she has received official notification from Dean Emmert, and her award-winning essay will be added to the archive of winning essays at the bottom of the page.
Biographical Sketch of Carol Andreae Haynes (1901-1990)
Carol Andreae Haynes was born into a Kentucky family of Franco-German descent with strong ties to agriculture. She grew up in Evansville, Indiana and on the family farmlands near Reed, Kentucky. She earned her A.A. and B.A. degrees in art (painting) at Logan College in Kentucky and Howard College in Tennessee, respectively. She also played on Howard College's women's basketball team and performed a vocal solo at her Commencement ceremony. As a college graduate, she became a pioneer and role model for all other women in her extended family who have earned college degrees ever since.
Following her marriage to Leander James McCormick Haynes (1898-1968), she became actively involved with community service in Evansville, Indiana. While raising a family of five daughters – all of whom attended Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri – she volunteered with local philanthropic organizations for over a quarter-century, especially the American Red Cross. Mrs. Haynes bequeathed to her descendants a wealth of oral family history that is still alive and well in their hearts and minds to this day. Her philosophy of life can be summed up in this passage from one of her all-time favorite books:
"Everything perishes except the world itself and its keepers. But while life lasts, everything on Earth has its use. The wise seek ways to be helpful to the world. ... Yet every man has his mission, which is to leave the world better, in some way, than he found it."
-- L. Frank Baum: The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (Book I, Chapters 6 & 7)
Sophomore Achievement Award Description
The Carol Andreae Haynes Sophomore Achievement Award celebrates the academic achievements of sophomore ACES James Scholar women. This prize was created in honor of Carol Andreae Haynes (1901-1990), the donor's maternal grandmother, who is the first woman in the donor's family tree known to have earned a Bachelor's degree. As such, she became a pioneer and role model for all other women in her extended family who have earned college degrees ever since. This annual award has been established to:- Encourage eligible candidates to reflect in a meaningful way on their experiences as ACES freshmen and share their experiences with others.
- Cultivate and reward the craft of insightful writing by the pioneering women who will fill leadership roles in the interdisciplinary world of tomorrow.
The Carol Andreae Haynes Sophomore Achievement Award is conferred in the fall semester of each academic year. Eligible candidates for the award must be sophomore women currently enrolled in the ACES James Scholar Honors Program, and they must have completed two full semesters of coursework at the University of Illinois' Urbana campus. Each of the eligible candidates is invited to write an original essay of between 500 and 1000 words on the following theme: The Most Valuable Things That I Learned as a Freshman in the College of ACES. The essay should be typed on 8-1/2” x 11” paper and double-spaced in a standard 12-point font.
These essays must be submitted by the specified deadline (the last Monday in October) to Dean Jason Emmert in ACES Student Development & Career Services (115 ACES Library). The names of the writers are concealed, and numbers are assigned to each essay to ensure an impartial evaluation by the Selection Committee. The essays are evaluated based on their exposition of valuable life lessons that the writers have learned as freshmen at the University of Illinois. The winner of the essay competition will receive a monetary prize and a copy of L. Frank Baum's classic fantasy novel, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1902), which was one of Mrs. Haynes' favorite books during her childhood days.
The essay competition is announced annually in September via a targeted emailing to all eligible candidates; in the Honors Program's bimonthly newsletter, Cursus Honorum; and on this website. The essays are evaluated by the Selection Committee after the submission deadline, and the presentation of the award to the recipient takes place before the end of the fall semester.
Carol Andreae Haynes Sophomore Achievement Award Winners and Their Essays: 2004-Present
- 2004 Winning Essay by Meg Dill Koch (PDF)
- 2005 Winning Essay by Jessica Anderson (PDF)
- 2006 Winning Essay by Melissa McEwen (PDF)
- 2007 Winning Essay by Andrea Jakubas (PDF)
- 2008 Winning Essay by Amy Readle (PDF)
- 2009 Winning Essay by Name TBA (PDF) -- Coming in December!
“It is true that great warriors and mighty kings and clever scholars of that day were often spoken of by the people; but no one of them was so greatly beloved as Santa Claus, because none other was so unselfish as to devote himself to making others happy. For a generous deed lives longer than a great battle or a king's decree or a scholar's essay, because it spreads and leaves its mark on all nature and endures through many generations.”
-- L. Frank Baum: The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (Book II, Chapter 11)
