Fulbright scholarships awarded to LU students

Seniors Will Gill and Elena Hudacek were recently awarded with Fulbright English Teaching Assistant awards to teach English in other countries. Gill will be teaching English in Germany for 10 months, and Hudacek will be teaching English in Colombia at the National University of Colombia at Bogotá. Alumnus Emilio Salvia ‘17 also won a Fulbright scholarship.

Gill had previously spent time in Germany both as a gap year and while studying abroad in Berlin during the 2016-2017 academic year. Spending time in Germany and learning more about the country as a German major taught Gill about the culture and language, and Assistant Professor of German Alison Guenther-Pal encouraged him to apply for the Fulbright scholarship.

“This is a chance for me to improve my own language skills,” said Gill, “and help young people learn about American culture and the English language.” Gill has yet to hear from the Fulbright commission about exactly which city he will be placed in, but he knows that he will be in the western German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

Hudacek decided to pursue a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant (ETA) award since she intends to teach English language learners in the future. “Having majored in linguistics and Spanish with the intention of teaching ELL,” said Hudacek “I determined that the Fulbright ETA program aligned closely with my future career goals.”

In addition to focusing on her teaching skills and improving her Spanish while in Colombia, Hudacek is also looking forward to carrying out the volunteering or research requirement of the award. Hudacek said that researching or volunteering “will give me the freedom to pursue interests outside of teaching and further engage with the community.”

The English Teaching Assistant award, according to the Fulbright website, aims to help local English teachers around the world by sending native English speakers to help in classrooms. Awards are usually given to recent college graduates who have not had much previous travel experience to the country in which they will be teaching.

There are several different types of Fulbright awards besides the English Teaching Assistant award. There is a Fulbright Study/ Research award with several different areas of research, all with different requirements depending on what country a student is applying to. There are also the Fulbright-National Geographic Storytelling Fellowship and the Critical Language Enhancement Award (CLEA).

Similarly, three Lawrence students also received Critical Language Scholarships, which send students to learn languages which have been decided to be critical to economic prosperity and national security. Junior Jonathan Rubin and senior Mikaela Marget were awarded scholarships to study Indonesian in Malang, Indonesia. Junior Heidi Arnold was awarded a scholarship to study Russian in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.