Benjamin Van De Water Receives Phi Kappa Phi Shirley Hockett Presidential Scholar Award

2014 Jan 17

Benjamin Van De Water, a senior music composition and theory in the School of Music at Ithaca College, is recipient of the Phi Kappa Phi Shirley Hockett Presidential Scholar Award. He will be honored in a ceremony with three other Presidential Scholars on Friday, Nov. 8, at Ithaca College.

At Ithaca College, Van De Water serves as treasurer of the Ithaca College Gamer Symphony Orchestra, a campus student organization, and conducts the College's all male a cappella group, Ithacapella. Benjamin also participates in Ithaca College's Varsity Track and Field team, specializing in Pole Vault.

The Shirley Hockett Presidential Scholar Award is given to a current student at Ithaca College who is a member of the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society. Founded in 1897 at the University of Maine, Phi Kappa Phi is the nation's oldest, largest, and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines. Its chapters are on more than 300 campuses in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. Each year, approximately 30,000 members are initiated.

The first requirement of eligibility for a Presidential Scholar Award is that the student be a member of Phi Kappa Phi, which means they were in the top 5 percent academically of their junior class. The student must be selected by a faculty or administrator for nomination and the award recipients are then chosen from the pool of nominations by Ithaca College's Phi Kappa Phi Executive Committee. The criteria used by this committee include grade point average, academic awards and honors, breadth of study, achievement in outside activities, and service to the profession and/or the community.