Open the Books Selects First Adam Andrzejewski Memorial Scholarship Winner
WASHINGTON -- Government watchdog Open the Books has annonced the inaugural winner of the Adam Andrzejewski Memorial Scholarship. The $25,000 award honors co-founder Andrzejewski's conviction that sunlight changes outcomes. It goes to a student who has helped advance transparency, accountability, and civic responsibility in their schools and communities.
The 2026 winner is Benjamin Rothove, a senior at the Univeristy of Wisconsin-Madison. When Rothove believed the campus newspaper was not covering all the facts and adequately holding the unversity accountable for its spending and policies, he started his own competitor, The Madison Federalist. He covered the lack of intellectual diversity among faculty, the chief diversity officer’s spending sprees, the listing of race-based scholarships on the university website, and more. Rothove ultimately landed a sitdown with the university's chancellor and had his pieces highlighted on cable news. He's since laid the groundwork for the paper to continue operating long after he's graduated.
Rothove's background also includes experiences at National Review, The College Fix and the Washington Post opinion page.
“We’re thrilled to be able to help Benjamin keep reminding his peers that there can be no accountability without first having transparency," said Open the Books Vice President Christopher Neefus. "Adam’s legacy is singular, and his spirit was indomitable. But every day we’re reminded that this is will be a generational effort that requires a critical mass of public support. As governments large and small find new ways to obscure how they spend, it’s up to individuals to push for open records laws and practices that uphold the Founders’ intentions.
“Article 1, Section 9 is simple enough, but in 2026, the vast expanses of public spending and byzantine disclosure rules mean Open the Books’ mission is far from complete. In fact, as long as the government is spending, we’ll need transparency advocates like Benjamin to continue the work."
Neefus also said the organization plans to continue highlighting young voices speaking up for transparency:
“The group of candidates who submitted applications were all doing extraordinary things so early in their journeys, and it’s made us really heartened about what’s to come for this movement. As we look ahead, we plan to keep encouraging a farm team of transparency advocates who will make sure Adam’s legacy endures.”
Andrzejewski, who passed unexpectedly in 2024, and co-founder Craig Mijares founded Open the Books with the understanding that spending accountability can only come with consistent transparency. In a 2020 speech to Hillsdale College that's since been viewed more than four million times on YouTube, Andrzejewski said:
"I am hopeful and optimistic about our future despite the corruption in Illinois and across the country, because you and I, we have been given the greatest gift in the last 5,000 years of human history. We've been given a Constitution that recognizes our inalienable rights. Our rights come from God and not government, and we instituted a government to secure our rights. And our founders knew that we needed the tools to hold that government accountable. Our founders knew that knowledge is power, and they recognized the power of transparency, and they wrote it into our founding documents."
Read more about Rothove and the scholarship at The College Fix and from journalist Mark Tapscott at his Substack, Mark Tapscott's Copy Desk.