Each scholarship provides $30,000 — $3,000 for the student's senior year and $27,000 for two or three years of graduate study. The program is open to juniors interested in public-service careers.

Laura Kleinman

Truman Scholars are selected based on academic performance, leadership and dedication to public service.

Seventy-five scholars were selected this year from 598 candidates, who were nominated by 311 universities.

Scholars also receive priority admission and supplemental financial aid at some premier graduate institutions, along with leadership training, career and graduate-school counseling and special internship opportunities within the federal government.

Kleinman said she is honored to have been awarded such a prestigious scholarship.

"I feel privileged to become part of a community of such exceptional students," she said. "The kids I met when I interviewed as a finalist are not only academically motivated, but also they are committed to using their integrity and strong sense of citizenship to making this world a better place."

Kleinman is majoring in philosophy in Arts & Sciences. After graduating, she hopes to pursue a joint degree in law and public policy.

"I'd like to work my way into the government through the court system and some day become an elected official so that I can promote positive social changes by speaking for people whose voices aren't being heard," Kleinman said.

A Danforth Scholar and residential adviser in the South 40, she tutors inner-city children and children of food-service workers. She also teaches classes on economic literacy, language skills, preventing adolescent pregnancy and other fundamental components of a foundation for a healthy and well-rounded education.

"Laura Kleinman is a model citizen of Washington University, a superb young scholar with a deep concern for the plight of the disadvantaged residents of America's inner cities," said Ian MacMullen, Ph.D., assistant dean in the College of Arts & Sciences. "The Truman Scholarship both recognizes and will help to realize Laura's remarkable potential to be a leader in the quest for justice in this country.

"We are enormously proud of her."