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Third Class of Cox Scholars Selected at IU

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Release Date: 11/06/2007

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Twenty-one Indiana University undergraduates have been honored with selection as Cox Scholars for the 2007-08 academic year.

The Jesse H. and Beulah Chanley Cox Scholarship Fund is IU's most generous merit-based scholarship for working students who are Indiana residents. The renewable scholarship provides 75% of the estimated cost of attendance on the Bloomington and IUPUI campuses. Applicants must demonstrate high academic achievement and work to earn 25% of their college expenses.

The Cox Scholarship offers special programs and seminars as well as an optional semester of study abroad. Now in its third year, the program funds more than 60 scholarships annually.

The Cox Scholarship program is made possible by a generous $15 million gift from IU alumnus Jesse Cox and his late wife, Beulah. The Coxes created the scholarship fund for working students because they understood the rigors of balancing school and work. He paid for his own IU education during the Great Depression by working and by running his own businesses, including a transportation service between Bloomington and Indianapolis and a mimeograph service. Jesse Cox credits his IU education for "decades of achievement and most of all for my supreme happiness."

After graduation in 1944, the Coxes started the J.H. Cox Manufacturing Co., which supplied venetian blinds to retailers Sears & Roebuck, L.S. Ayres and William H. Block. Shortly afterward, they bought a small, bankrupt company and started Aero Blind & Drapery Inc. When the Coxes sold the business in 1982, Aero had 920 employees and annual sales of $30 million.

Through ventures such as Jesse H. Cox Inc. and B.J. Realty Inc., the Coxes began to farm nearly 1,500 acres of land in Boone, Hamilton and Putnam counties, and to manage commercial real estate rental property.

"Jesse and Beulah Cox understood both how challenging it can be to finance a college degree and how important that degree is to a student's future," said Curt Simic, president of the IUF, which administers the scholarships. "These students are as deserving as they are hard working."

Members of the 2007-08 class of Cox Scholars are:

  • Erika Barrios, Lebanon, IU Bloomington
  • Sarah Bielski, New Albany, IU Bloomington
  • Jessica Daugherty, Bloomington, IU Bloomington
  • Deanna Elkins, Marion, IU Bloomington
  • Cody Grabbe, Indianapolis, IU Bloomington
  • Lauren Hall, Indianapolis, IU Bloomington
  • Justin Hoering, Fort Wayne, IU Bloomington
  • Chelsea Kennedy, Huntington, IU Bloomington
  • Britt Leiendecker, Indianapolis, IUPUI
  • Melissa Maxwell, Brownsburg, IUPUI
  • Paula McCann, Bloomington, IU Bloomington
  • Talia Montesonti, Indianapolis, IUPUI
  • Roya Porter, Indianapolis, IU Bloomington
  • David Rosenberg, Indianapolis, IU Bloomington
  • Adam Schaller, Cedar Lake, IU Bloomington
  • Cory Schewe, Indianapolis, IUPUI
  • Jena Schrader, Peru, IU Bloomington
  • Sarah Sexson, Indianapolis, IUPUI
  • Faye Stokes, Michigan City, IU Bloomington
  • Vivek Trivedi, Indianapolis, IUPUI
  • Jenna Wood, Greenfield, IUPUI

To learn more about the program and how to apply, go to http://coxscholars.indiana.edu/.