Julie Veroff, a senior in the CDDRL Honors Program, has been named a Rhodes Scholar. She is one of 32 American men and women selected each year for this prestigious award, the oldest and best known for international study, which provides for two to three years of graduate study at the University of Oxford in England. Veroff plans to begin a M.Phil. program in development studies at Oxford next fall.

Veroff has done volunteer work on behalf of women's and refugees' rights in Nicaragua, Ghana, and Zambia through a United Nations partner organization focusing on refugee empowerment. At Stanford she is majoring in international relations, and will be working closely for the rest of this academic year with her advisor, CDDRL faculty affiliate James D. Fearon, on her honors thesis project, The Impact of Elections on Peace Durability and Quality of Democracy After Civil Wars. This fall Veroff had the opportunity to interview one of CDDRL's Stanford Summer Fellows in Democracy and Development, Luhiriri Byamungu, a human rights lawyer from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The CDDRL Honors Program offers students majoring in International Relations the opportunity to conduct an independent research project focused on issues of democracy, development, and the rule of law under CDDRL faculty guidance. Such a project requires a high degree of initiative and dedication, significant amounts of time and energy, and demonstrated skills in research and writing. Honors students present a formal defense of their theses in mid-May of their senior year.

Students interested in the CDDRL Honors Program should consult with prospective honors advisers in their junior year and plan to submit their honors thesis proposal in the spring quarter of that year. Choosing courses that provide academic background in an applicant's area of inquiry and demonstrating an ability to conduct independent research are prerequisites for the program, as are a 3.5 grade-point average and strong overall academic record. Required coursework includes INTNL REL199, an honors research seminar that focuses on democracy, development, and the rule of law in developing countries.