The National Football Foundation (NFF) & College Hall of Fame named Nebraska's Rex Burkhead and Northwestern's Patrick Ward two of 15 recipients of the NFF National Scholar-Athlete Awards. Burkhead and Ward were selected from a nationwide pool of 147 semifinalists from among all NCAA divisions and the NAIA. The two Big Ten student-athletes are now finalists for the 2012 William V. Campbell Trophy, which recognizes an individual as the absolute best scholar-athlete in the nation. The NFF's National Scholar-Athlete program, launched in 1959, is the first initiative in history to award scholar-athletes postgraduate scholarships for their combined athletic, academic and leadership abilities. Each finalist will receive an $18,000 postgraduate scholarship at the 55th NFF Annual Awards Dinner on December 4 at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City, and one of the 15 will be announced as the 23rd recipient of the Campbell Trophy. Michigan State's Kirk Cousins and Purdue's Joe Holland earned NFF National Scholar-Athlete Awards last season. Two Big Ten standouts have won the Campbell Trophy - Ohio State's Bobby Hoying in 1995 and Craig Krenzel in 2003.