Before winning a Truman Scholar award this year, UD politics major Aubrey Wieberg, BA ’24, was a high school student with a free summer. Wieberg had heard about UD’s Arete program by chance from a friend, and she decided to enroll for the two-week introduction to the classics because, as she tells it, “It was something to do during the summer.”
The close mentorship she found with the UD faculty immediately attracted her. Three years later, Wieberg credits faculty members like history professor Charles Sullivan, Ph.D., for guiding her to the life of public service that her new scholarship will support.
The Truman Scholarship is the foremost graduate scholarship in the country for aspiring public servants. The award recognizes students for outstanding leadership and grants them funding to pursue graduate education for a career in service.
The competition draws applicants from top institutions, and only students that receive the approval of their institution can apply. Out of 705 applicants, Aubrey is one of just 62 students to receive the award.
The Truman Scholar selection process also requires applicants to compose a workable policy proposal. Wieberg’s application took three years to complete.
Wieberg is UD’s first Truman Scholar, as well as the creator of UD’s Big Event and the founder of the Dallas Refugee Project.
In addition to the policy proposal, the application process requires 14 essays, three recommendations, a transcript and an interview. Wieberg says Sullivan helped shepherd her through the process and prepare her for the panel interview, along with Gaby O’Neil, Christina Nguyen and others in the Office of Personal Career Development. During her interview, which took place in Washington, D.C., she found herself well-prepared.
“I got there and it was not as bad as everyone told me. I think I almost over-prepared mentally, which actually might have helped me,” Wieberg said.
“I was prepared for an intellectual interview, but it was more like a kind conversation. It was a good experience. I think it might have been the best experience to just know the other finalists, too, because we were in a room for eight hours, playing cards or discussing current events. We were just talking and getting to know each other.”
Having worked closely with Wieberg, Sullivan called the award well-deserved.
“From the moment Aubrey Wieberg arrived on the University of Dallas campus, she has been committed to fostering a culture of public service. She has done so both in initiatives such as the Big Event in the fall semester and in a diverse array of initiatives in the Dallas/Fort Worth community addressing the needs of refugees,” Sullivan said.
“The Truman Scholarship recognizes Aubrey’s remarkable dedication to public service and her potential for transformative leadership.”
Wieberg encourages UD students to see for themselves how far their education can take them.
“Your education can empower you to apply to these and be a successful candidate. I interviewed with people from Harvard and Duke and NYU and Brown and Oberlin, and none of them got it,” Wieberg said.
“You can go on a national and international stage. Your education has prepared you. I was really scared to go up against people from these giant universities. … I think having the moxie to apply like this is important, and I think we forget about that.”
For Wieberg, a central part of that education is the close involvement UD students can enjoy with faculty. She first saw the value of that personal support as a high school student exploring the great books in Arete.
“I sat on the mall with two faculty members and they helped me write my Arete thesis,” Wieberg recalls. “It’s just this one-on-one support and encouragement that I found in the Arete program and then that I also experienced through my education here. And it was that kind of blind optimism that Dr. Sullivan gave me,” she added.
“Boy, that paid off. I would never have believed in myself enough to do that without his encouragement, and all the faculty, too.”
Thanks to the scholarship, Wieberg plans on making the Georgetown Institute of Politics and Public Service her next stop after she graduates from UD.
