Brittany Edwardes and Kathy Hill of the University of Central Arkansas have been awarded the Fulbright U.S. Student Program scholarship, the United States Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board announced recently.
Edwardes and Hill are among the more than 1,700 U.S. citizens who will travel abroad for the 2012-2013 academic year through the Fulbright U.S. Student Program.
Edwardes, of Texarkana, will be going to Malaysia. Hill, of Benton, will be going to South Korea. Both students will be participating in an English Teaching Assistantship. Learn more about the UCA Fulbright Award recipients.
Edwardes graduated in May with a major in English and a minor in Interdisciplinary Studies through the Honors College. She studied social sciences and English in Thailand during the spring of 2011. She also taught English to children from age nine to 12 during her time in Thailand. Edwardes has interned for the Peace Corps, Arkansas State AmeriCorps and the Winthrop Rockefeller Institute. She plans to begin graduate work at the Clinton School for Public Service when she returns from Malaysia.
Kathy Hill
Edwardes said she chose Malaysia for a couple of reasons.
“I love southeast Asia so I really wanted to return,” she said. “I’m also doing my thesis on Muslim women so I thought it might be interesting to sort of combine my thesis ideas with my southeast Asia experience.”
Hill graduated in May with a major in Sociology and a minor in Interdisciplinary Studies through the Honors College. She interned at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul in the summer of 2011. Hill learned Korean during her time there.
“I want to share with them something they were able to share with me which is language,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to be a high school teacher and this will give me a perspective on what it’s like to be a teacher.”
Hill plans to start graduate school in International Relations after she returns from South Korea.
The Fulbright Program is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government and is designed to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries. The primary source of funding for the Fulbright Program is an annual appropriation made by the U.S. Congress to the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Participating governments and host institutions, corporations and foundations in foreign countries and in the United States also provide direct and indirect support. Recipients of Fulbright grants are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement, as well as demonstrated leadership potential in their fields. The Program operates in over 155 countries worldwide.
Since its establishment in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late U.S. Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, the Fulbright Program has given approximately 300,000 students, scholars, teachers, artists, and scientists the opportunity to study, teach and conduct research, exchange ideas and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns. –
– Spencer Griffin
