Scott Hershovitz AB ’98, MA ’98 likes to say he got degrees from Oxford and Yale but got his education at UGA.
“It’s hard to overstate the foundational influence of UGA in my life,” says Hershovitz, a professor of law and philosophy at the University of Michigan.
The Honors program quite literally set him on his career path. Hershovitz came to UGA as a political science major and wanted to take a psychology course. It was full, so he signed up for Honors Introduction to Philosophy instead.
“Within the first hour in the room, I thought, ‘This is what I want to do with my life,’” he says.
Over the next four years, UGA and the Honors program shaped his path forward. Hershovitz thrived in the intense environment. Faculty encouraged his inquisitiveness and urged him to keep an eye out for scholarship opportunities.
He applied to law school and for the Rhodes Scholarship, and after winning the Rhodes, he studied philosophy at Oxford.
“I feel like I found a loophole in life. I’m a philosopher, but I get paid like a lawyer,” he says. “And none of that’s true without the kind of foundation that UGA gave me.”
At its core, the Rhodes is not about being the most knowledgeable in a subject or even the most knowledgeable person on your campus, Hershovitz says. It’s about conveying your passion for a topic and getting others interested.
“It turns out to be an extraordinary useful life skill in general,” he says. “Whatever it is you’re going to do in the world, chances are you have to get other people excited about your projects and plans, to anticipate what questions they’ll have for you and what hurdles they’ll see.”
