Nicholas Dowdall is a Psychology Honours student who has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship for postgraduate studies. He has previously been awarded various other scholarships, including the University of Buenos Aires Scholarship for foreigners in 2009, a UCT Entrance Scholarship and three UCT Faculty Scholarships during his degree, a Heritage Academic Exchange Scholarship to Boston College, USA, in 2011 and a Crossley Foundation Scholarship in 2012. He completed a B. Soc. Sci degree in 2013 with majors in Psychology, Economics and Spanish, obtaining distinctions in Psychology and Spanish and the degree with distinction.

 

At UCT Nicholas was the Vice-Chair of the UCT Habitat for Humanity and has been involved in various community support initiatives. In 2013 he was selected as a UCT delegate for the ‘Brightest Young Minds’ Conference. He has a black belt in karate, was the SA junior champion for three years running and has represented South Africa twice, in the Cape Town and Tokyo World Championships. He has represented Western Province in tennis and is a keen golfer. He was also a member of Simply Blue, an a capella singing group that toured South America in 2008, and a guitarist and singer in a rock band.

 

In 2014 he is completing an Honours degree in Psychology at UCT before beginning an M.Sc. in Evidence-based Social Intervention and Policy Evaluation at Oxford in October. He will later decide whether to diversify with a second Masters degree, or pursue a D.Phil at Oxford. At this stage he sees himself in the future working between academic and research settings and the NGO sector.