Speech senior John Broach can’t stop talking about Medical Supplies Mission. Even his appointment to USA Today’s 2002 All-USA Academic Team – partly because he founded the NU group that sends health kits to poor countries – doesn’t steer him from the mission.
“I was initially really exited because I thought it would be a good way to get the word out about MSM,” Broach said Wednesday, the day of USA Today’s announcement. “I hope it can be good for the organization.”
Broach is the second Northwestern student to make the First Team, following Ethan Plaut, Weinberg ’01, in 2000. Weinberg senior Puneet Singh was named to the Second Team and Medill senior Melissa Harris was named to the Third Team from a pool of 600 applicants.
The judges from educational organizations such as the American Council on Education and the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities choose 20 students for each “all-star” team, said Tracey Wong Briggs, USA Today’s coordinator of the academic teams.
“There are lots of students who go to college and get A’s and are really smart,” Briggs said. “The judges look very carefully at how students use their intellectual skills beyond the classroom.”
Broach serves as executive vice president of NU Globe and president of the Alpha Phi Omega community service club. But the group he founded sophomore year, Medical Supplies Mission, has begun to spread to other campuses. He is speaking at a conference this weekend about the group, which he said has packaged and sent about 2,000 kilograms of medical supplies to countries including Haiti, Afghanistan and Papua New Guinea.
His solid academic performance in the Honors Program in Medical Education and as a human communications sciences major first made him stand out, said Speech Prof. Charles Larson, who sponsored his application to the academic team. But his contributions outside the classroom made him seem even more special, he said.
“I can’t recall another student in recent years who has done quite as much at the national or global level in attempting to help disadvantaged people,” Larson was quoted as saying in USA Today.
“(Winning the award) is an illustration of how he demonstrates his caring about other people and his desire to help them,” Larson told THE DAILY. “You can’t demonstrate it any stronger than that.”
University President Henry Bienen congratulated the three winners in his State of the University address Wednesday. But Broach said the recognition he’s receiving from his family has had the most effect on him.
“They’re telling everybody to buy the paper and that kind of stuff,” Broach said. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”
