The list of 2026 Rhodes Scholars includes five NCAA student-athletes: Stanford's Sydney Barta, Army West Point's Johnathan Pinc, MIT's Alice Hall, Colby's Dan Juzych and the University of the South's Kylene Monaghan.
Among 32 Americans to receive the honor, the five student-athletes will receive fully funded postgraduate studies at the University of Oxford in England. According to the Rhodes Trust, the scholarship identifies young leaders from around the world who, through the pursuit of education together at Oxford, forge bonds of mutual understanding and fellowship for the betterment of humankind.
Below is a brief biographical sketch of each student-athlete:
Sydney Barta
Sydney Barta majors in bioengineering and is the first Paralympian to compete on Stanford's track and field team. She has won multiple medals in World Para Athletics and Parapan American competition as a member of the U.S. national team and serves as a representative on the Team USA Athletes' Commission, advocating for all Paralympians. Barta is also co-president of Stanford's chapter of Tau Beta Pi, the national engineering honor society, and serves on the Collegiate Advisory Council for the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee. In addition, she sings in Stanford's a cappella group Counterpoint.
At Oxford, Barta plans to pursue graduate studies in musculoskeletal sciences.
Johnathan Pinc
Army West Point's Johnathan Pinc is a chemistry major and men's gymnastics student-athlete.
He conducts research with the academy's Protein Biophysics Research Group, focusing on small-molecule treatments. Pinc has presented research on neurodegenerative disease at six conferences and published two peer-reviewed articles. He received the national Goldwater Scholarship, as well as the Stamps Scholarship. Pinc leads the Army West Point chapter of the American Chemical Society. At Oxford, he will pursue a master's in chemistry.
Alice Hall
Alice Hall is a women's basketball student-athlete at MIT, majoring in chemical engineering and minoring in Spanish. Hall has worked with MIT's D-Lab to design sustainable tools for women's collectives in Ghana. She serves as MIT's student body president. Hall also serves on the Presidential Advisory Cabinet and is an active member of the Gordon-MIT Engineering Leadership Program, the Black Students' Union and MIT's chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers. On the court, she earned New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference Rookie of the Year honors and twice earned Academic All-Conference honors. At Oxford, she intends to pursue a doctorate in engineering science.
Dan Juzych
Dan Juzych, a men's ice hockey student-athlete at Colby, is majoring in biology. Off the ice, Juzych is deeply involved in global health initiatives. He launched a project to establish ophthalmic surgical training centers in Ukraine and developed a process to import donor corneas, traveling to Ukraine twice since its war with Russia began. Juzych is active in the Ukrainian American community and performs Ukrainian dance. At Oxford, he plans to complete master's degrees in global health and the history of science, medicine and technology.
Kylene Monaghan
Kylene Monaghan is a women's soccer student-athlete at Sewanee, where she majors in mathematics and physics and ranks first in her class. Monaghan captains Sewanee's soccer team and has won two Southern Athletic Association championships, earning United Soccer Coaches All-Region first-team honors, as well as receiving All-SAA recognition twice. She also ran track for Sewanee, setting a school record in the 4x400 meter relay. Monaghan serves as president of the Sewanee chapter of the Society of Physics Students. She has interned at CERN's Large Hadron Collider and worked on research in quantum computing and thermal engineering. At Oxford, she will pursue master's degrees in engineering science and quantum technologies.
