[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 175 (Thursday, December 3, 2015)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1706]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




CONGRATULATING MISS ERICKA WHEELER ON HER SELECTION AS A RHODES SCHOLAR

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. BENNIE G. THOMPSON

                             of mississippi

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, December 3, 2015

  Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor an 
extraordinary young scholar, Miss Ericka Wheeler. Ericka is currently a 
senior at Millsap College majoring in English and History with plans to 
become a physician after watching her grandfather suffer from 
Alzheimer's disease.
  Ericka wrote a thesis tracking how police brutality and race have 
been treated in fiction since the 1930s. She attended Greenwood High 
School for two years, followed by her junior and senior year at the 
Mississippi School of Math and Science in Columbus.
  Her journeys so far have taken her from Mississippi to Cambodia and 
Cuba. Her next stop will be England, as a Rhodes Scholar. She is the 
first African-American woman from Mississippi to claim the prestigious 
honor and has been chosen as one of 32 U.S. men and women who will 
enter Oxford University next fall for postgraduate study. Ericka, who 
plans to attend medical school later, said she will study medical 
anthropology.
  Millsap's President Robert Pearigen said Wheeler's devotion to 
Mississippi's Delta region is part of what makes her special. ``She 
encountered some of the greatest poverty and starkest racial divisions 
found in the developed world,'' Pearigen said in a statement. ``She is 
bound to the place by a sense of duty but is motivated to care for it 
by a love for its people.''
  Ericka said she was inspired to become a physician after watching her 
grandfather suffer from Alzheimer's disease. Since his death, she's 
worked with other Alzheimer's patients to record their life stories, 
producing documents for their families.
  Wheeler credited the impetus for her application to history Professor 
Robert McElvaine. As a student of McElvaine, Wheeler traveled to 
Vietnam and Cambodia after her freshman year and to Cuba after her 
sophomore year. ``I remember him saying the chances weren't very great 
at all, but it would be a good process to go through,'' Wheeler said. 
``They didn't want to get my hopes up.''
  I urge Miss Wheeler to continue to break barriers and strive for 
academic excellence.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing Miss 
Ericka Wheeler for her dedication to serving others and scholastic 
achievement.

                          ____________________