Trinidadian wins 2026 Commonwealth Caribbean Rhodes Scholarship

Trinida­di­an El­liot Ross-Dick has been se­lect­ed as the win­ner of the 2026 Com­mon­wealth Caribbean Rhodes Schol­ar­ship, earn­ing the op­por­tu­ni­ty to pur­sue post­grad­u­ate stud­ies at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ox­ford.

Ross-Dick was an­nounced as the re­cip­i­ent dur­ing an awards cer­e­mo­ny on Tues­day evening, fol­low­ing a com­pet­i­tive se­lec­tion process which saw eight can­di­dates ad­vance to the fi­nal stage.

An­nounc­ing the win­ner, Pres­i­dent of Bar­ba­dos, His Ex­cel­len­cy the Most Ho­n­ourable Jef­frey Bostic, said the se­lec­tion com­mit­tee had been im­pressed by the can­di­dates, but ul­ti­mate­ly had on­ly one schol­ar­ship to award.

“We’ve been im­pressed by you, and we know that you have what it takes to go to the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ox­ford,” Bostic said.

He said the suc­cess­ful can­di­date was ex­pect­ed to rep­re­sent the 17 na­tions of the Com­mon­wealth Caribbean.

The Rhodes Schol­ar­ship was es­tab­lished fol­low­ing a con­tri­bu­tion made by Ce­cil Rhodes to the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ox­ford in 1902. The first schol­ar­ship re­cip­i­ent en­rolled in 1903.

Speak­ing af­ter the an­nounce­ment, Ross-Dick said he was filled with joy and grat­i­tude, ac­knowl­edg­ing the peo­ple who had sup­port­ed him through­out his jour­ney.

“I think that I wouldn’t have been able to make this jour­ney with­out my com­mu­ni­ty,” he said.

He said he was al­ready think­ing about the op­por­tu­ni­ties ahead and the next chap­ter of his aca­d­e­m­ic jour­ney.

At Ox­ford, Ross-Dick plans to pur­sue stud­ies in ed­u­ca­tion, be­gin­ning with re­search, de­sign and meth­ods in ed­u­ca­tion be­fore mov­ing on to in­ter­na­tion­al and com­par­a­tive ed­u­ca­tion.

He al­so ex­pressed grat­i­tude to the peo­ple who had helped him reach the mile­stone, de­scrib­ing their sup­port as in­stru­men­tal in his achieve­ment.