Dive Summary:
- Northern Illinois University is working hard to change the image that only Ivy League students can get Fulbright awards as part of a larger effort to use the program to internationalize its campus, encouraging more students to apply for the awards, convincing faculty to take advantage of Fulbright opportunities and bringing in foreign Fulbright participants to teach.
- In the last five years, eight students have received Fulbright awards, as compared to three in the five years between 2001 and 2006, and the Institute of International Education, which administers the program, says the university should aim for eight applications per year.
- The school has also used the Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Program to strengthen its expertise in Asia, and this year has teaching assistants from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Phillipines and Thailand in its Center for Southeast Asian Studies.
From the article:
As an undergraduate at Northern Illinois University, Nora Lindvall didn't think Fulbright awards were for students like her. "Only the Harvard kids get that," she remembers thinking. But after the university "bombarded" her and her classmates with information about the opportunities, Ms. Lindvall applied. Now a Fulbright grant is supporting her studies at the University of Amsterdam, where she plans to earn a master's degree in conflict resolution and governance. ...