Mica and Ahmet Ertegun Scholarships in the Humanities Announced at Oxford

Mica and Ahmet Ertegun Scholarships in the Humanities Announced at Oxford

Major New Graduate Scholarship Programme at Oxford Made Possible by the Most Generous Gift for Humanities Students in the University's 900-year History

LONDON, February 29, 2012/PRNewswire/ --

The University of Oxford has established The Mica and Ahmet Ertegun Graduate
Scholarship Programme in the Humanities, which will be launched immediately with 15
scholarships a year and will eventually be endowed in perpetuity to award at least 35
graduate humanities scholarships annually.

Leading humanities students from throughout the world will compete for full graduate
scholarships in fields as diverse as literature, history, music, archaeology, art history,
Asian studies, and Middle Eastern studies.

The recipients of the prestigious award will have the exclusive use of The Mica and
Ahmet Ertegun House for the Study of the Humanities, a five-storey Georgian building in
the heart of Oxford, which will be fitted out with state-of-the-art technological
capability and serve as the base for study and research by the Ertegun Scholars.

The gift will ultimately amount to more than GBP26 million. In addition to funding the
scholarships themselves in perpetuity, the gift will also endow in perpetuity the salary
of a full-time Ertegun Senior Scholar in Residence who will provide mentorship for the
Ertegun Scholars, and a Programme of lectures, seminars, concerts and other activities at
Ertegun House.

The Chancellor of the University of Oxford, Lord Patten, said: "Through the generosity
of Mica Ertegun, the best Humanities graduate students in the world will have the
opportunity, in perpetuity, to undertake high-quality research, to interact with other
fine minds, and to increase the sum of human knowledge and understanding. This kind of
support for postgraduates is vital for the future of research and human understanding, and
vital for the future of great universities like Oxford. It allows us to ensure that the
very best minds are supporting the University's research endeavour now and will be the
cutting edge researchers of the future."

Mica Ertegun, the Romanian-born widow of famed Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun,
lives in New York City and is one of the world's foremost interior designers.

"For Ahmet and for me, one of the great joys of life has been the study of history,
music, languages, literature, art and archaeology," Mrs. Ertegun said. "In these times,
when there is so much strife in the world, I believe it is tremendously important to
support those things that endure across time, that bind people together from every
culture, and that enrich the capacity of human beings to understand one another and make
the world a more humane place. I am very proud of the Ertegun Graduate Scholarship
Programme at Oxford, and I intend that it provide an enduring inspiration for brilliant
and enthusiastic students from all over the world to devote themselves to the study of the
Humanities. My dream is that, one day, Ertegun Scholars will be leaders in every field -
as historians and philosophers, as archaeologists and literary scholars, as writers and
composers, as statesmen and theologians."

Oxford's Vice-Chancellor, Andrew Hamilton, said of the Ertegun Graduate Scholarship
Programme: "This is a significant moment for the study of the Humanities and the largest
donation specifically for the Humanities in the 900-year history of Oxford. At a time
when, in the UK, government support for the Humanities is under intense pressure, vision
and generosity like this is going to be what saves the field for future generations. We
are immensely grateful to Mrs Ertegun and Americans for Oxford, Inc. for making the
Ertegun Graduate Scholarship Programme possible."

Ertegun House will be ready for the first group of Ertegun Scholars in the Michaelmas
term, commencing in September 2012.

Website: http://www.ox.ac.uk/ertegun

Source: The University of Oxford

Press Enquiries: Erica Bolton, Bolton & Quinn, Tel: +44(0)20-7221-5000, Mobile: +447711-698-186, Email: erica@boltonquinn.com; or Matt Pickles, Press Officer, University of Oxford, Tel: +44(0)1865-270046, Email: matt.pickles@admin.ox.ac.uk

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