The Fulbright Program is a prestigious international exchange initiative that awards about 1,100 grants to American scholars each year. Funded by the U.S. government, Fulbright Scholars are chosen based on their leadership and academic merits and their abilities to teach, conduct research, and contribute to solutions for shared international concerns.

Wanda Costen, associate professor in Retail, Hospitality, and Tourism Management, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant for the 2013 –2014 academic year. She is studying gender inequality, specifically the social closure barriers that prevent women’s upward career mobility, in the resort industry in Jamaica. In addition to her research, Costen is teaching in the Department of Management Studies within the Mona School of Business and Management at the University of West Indies –Mona. Upon her return, Costen plans to write a book explaining how the barriers to women’s career progression are socially constructed.

Scott Frey, professor of sociology and co-director of the Center for the Study of Social Justice, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant for the fall term of 2013. He is studying the adverse environmental, health, and socioeconomic consequences of pesticide use under export-focused rice production in Vietnam. In addition to his research, Frey is lecturing at the Vietnam National University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City on issues related to the environment and development. Frey is currently working on a book examining how and why hazardous products and wastes are displaced to the peripheral zones of the world economy.

Rebecca Klenk, lecturer in interdisciplinary programs and affiliated faculty member with the Anthropology Department and the Disaster, Displacement, and Human Rights Program, has been awarded a Fulbright grant for the spring term of 2014. She will lecture and work with graduate students in the Anthropology Department at the University of Delhi in India. Along with teaching, she will develop new research on global educational restructuring, and collaborate with colleagues in India to plan a project on community experiences of, and educational responses to, Himalayan climate change.

Timothy Young, a professor in the Forest Products Center at the Institute of Agriculture, also received an award for the fall term. Young is in Austria conducting research on cross-laminated timber and teaching graduate courses in design of experiments and statistical process control at Salzburg University of Applied Sciences.

Melanie Eldridge, formerly a research assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology,  received an award to carry out a research project in Brazil for the fall term of 2013. She recently accepted a position at another university.

Since its establishment in 1946, the Fulbright Program has given approximately 310,000 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. The Fulbright US Scholar Program is administered by the Council for International Exchange of Scholars, a division of the Institute of International Education.

For more information, visit the Fulbright program’s website.

—

CONTACT:

Whitney Heins (865-974-5460, wheins@utk.edu)

The Fulbright Program is a prestigious international exchange initiative that awards about 1,100 grants to American scholars each year. Funded by the US government, Fulbright Scholars are chosen based on their leadership and academic merits and their abilities to teach, conduct research, and contribute to solutions for shared international concerns.

Michelle Commander, assistant professor of English, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to lecture and conduct research at the University of Ghana, Legon for this academic year. She will teach courses on literature of the black diaspora, conduct follow-up ethnographic research, and write her book manuscript, Afro-Atlantic Speculative Fictions: Flight, Mythmaking, and the African Fantastic.

David Fox, professor of architecture, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to teach at Krakow Polytechnic in Krakow, Poland, and conduct research. His term will begin in January 2013 for the spring semester. Fox will be teaching drawing and design classes. Fox specializes in affordable housing design, urban residential development, freehand drawing and perception, and architectural photography.

Sarah Lowe, professor of art, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to conduct research at the University of Oslo in Norway for this academic year. Lowe will work with Intermedia, a research center at the university exploring the boundaries of digital environments in communication, interaction and learning. She plans to use her research on a project with the Eastern Band of Cherokee in Cherokee, North Carolina, in which a mobile application is being used to educate Cherokee students.

Sam Swan, professor of journalism and electronic media and director of internationalization and outreach in the College of Communication and Information, has been awarded a Senior Fulbright Specialist grant to teach at the University of Zagreb in Croatia. Swan will conduct workshops on television news for the month of December. Swan has worked at the University of Zagreb for the past ten years conducting television journalism training programs and is the leading media trainer throughout Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia.

Since its establishment in 1946, the Fulbright Program has given approximately 310,000 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. The Fulbright US Scholar Program is administered by the Council for International Exchange of Scholars, a division of the Institute of International Education.

For more information, visit fulbright.state.gov.

—

C O N T A C T :

Whitney Heins (865-974-5460, wheins@utk.edu)

Pia Wood from the Center for International Education and Alan Rutenberg from the Office of Research are UT Knoxville’s representatives to the Fulbright Program. They will discuss types of awards, how to international contacts, best practices, and advice on the application process.

R.S.V.P. to Bea Misch at bmisch@utk.edu or 974-3177.

“We got lost on the way there, arrived and hurriedly paid double for scalped tickets. The show was incredible, and we almost missed the last train back to the hotel. It was definitely a highlight of my adolescence,” Wofford recalled.

Ever since, Wofford has had a bug for travelling. He’s been to Managua, Nicaragua, with his church; Santo Domingo; Ecuador with Habitat for Humanity; and on a summer trip with college roommates to Europe where he ventured to Spain, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic, Germany, and the Netherlands. While at UT, Wofford studied abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina, for five months then took a one-month bus trip from Lima, Peru, to Bogota, Colombia.

Now, Wofford is on his way to Mexico City as one of five current students or recent graduates from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who have received grants from the Fulbright US Student Program to work and study abroad. This is the largest number of student Fulbright winners that UT Knoxville has had in at least twenty years.

Wofford, of Nashville, will spend ten months in Mexico City, working full-time for Ashoka, an international non-governmental organization (NGO) that helps social entrepreneurs start or expand new NGOs. He will take graduate-level business classes at night.

“I’m thrilled about the opportunity to live and work in such a large, culturally rich city,” said Wofford, who graduated from UT Knoxville in December 2010 with a bachelor’s degree in public relations and minors in business and political science.

The Fulbright Student Program provides full grants to approximately 1,700 U.S. students for graduate study and research or work as English teaching assistants in more than 140 countries worldwide each year.

Sponsored by the Department of State and named for the late Senator J. William Fulbright, the Fulbright Program was established by Congress in 1946 to “enable the government of the United States to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries.” In addition to the US Student Program, Fulbright also sponsors teaching and research awards for faculty and awards for international students to conduct graduate study at U.S. universities.

Another UT student Fulbright winner is Shande King, of Knoxville, an honors graduate who finished a bachelor’s degree in math and French in May 2010 and his master’s degree in education in May 2011. He will be going to Paris, France, for an English teaching assistantship. He also may teach a math class.

King said he’s looking forward to returning to France, where he studied abroad in 2009, and visiting two of his favorite types of places—French grocery stores and museums. Having a whole year to absorb the French culture will arm him with insights and experiences that will help him make French classes much more interesting for his future American students, he said.

In addition to Wofford and King, the other UT student Fulbright winners are:

• Maha Ayesh, who earned her undergraduate degree and law degree at UT and has been working as an attorney. She will be going to Jordan to study issues related to the country’s nascent anti-human trafficking legal reform, particularly as it relates to migrant domestic workers.
• Ariel Brassil, a spring 2011 honors graduate whose degree is in language and world business with a German emphasis. She will be going to Germany for an English teaching assistantship.
• Amy Hill, a fall 2010 graduate in German. She also will be going to Germany for an English teaching assistantship.

UT’s Office of National Scholarships and Fellowships (ONSF) was established in late 2007, and Michael Handelsman, a professor in Modern Foreign Languages, took over as faculty director in July of this year.

The office helps UT students and alumni apply for prestigious scholarships, such as the Rhodes, Marshall, Gates-Cambridge, and Mitchell. It also assists undergraduates in applying for major scholarships such as the Goldwater, Udall, and Truman.

“This year’s Fulbright winners all put a lot of work into the application process,” said Rebekah Page, ONSF’s assistant director. “I felt really strong about them last year when we did the interviews, but it’s still really gratifying to have them all win.”

Applications for 2012-2013 academic year Fulbright US Student Program competition became available on May 1, 2011. Completed applications are due by September 14, 2011.

“Because the Fulbright program recommends beginning the application at least two months in advance of the deadline, we encouraged interested students to meet with someone in our office last spring. Most of them worked with our staff throughout the summer to prepare the applications they’ll submit next month,” Page said. The final part of the application process is a campus interview that will take place in October.

For more information about national scholarship and fellowships, see http://onsf.utk.edu/about/about.html or call 865-974-7875.

C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely (865-974-5034, ablakely@utk.edu)

Taylor Feild

Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, the program seeks to broaden worldwide understanding of political, economic, educational and cultural institutions.

Paul Gellert

The six professors are among about 800 faculty and professionals who will travel abroad through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program during the 2010-11 academic year. Most UT Knoxville award recipients will devote up to a semester working in a university department or institute engaged in teaching and research.

The recipients were chosen for their academic or professional achievement and demonstrated leadership potential in their fields.

Donald G. Hodges

“The knowledge these faculty members will gain as Fulbright Scholars is invaluable to the UT Knoxville community, including their colleagues and their students. The faculty members at UT Knoxville continue to make strides in their fields here and abroad and we are proud they have the opportunity to represent our university on campuses around the world,” said UT Senior Vice Chancellor and Provost Susan Martin.

David Keffer

The recipients are as follows:

• Taylor Feild, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, will travel to sub-Saharan Africa for seven months to study evolutionary hydraulic ecophysiology of East African pepperbark trees.

Jeff Norrell

• Paul Gellert, assistant professor in the department of sociology, has been honored with a Senior Scholar Fulbright Award. He will travel to Paramadina University, Jakarta, Indonesia, for 10 months to lecture and conduct research on the controversies surrounding policies and outcomes of extraction of natural resources in Indonesia.

• Donald G. Hodges, James R. Cox Professor of Forest Economics and Policy in the College of Agricultural Sciences and natural resources’ department of forestry, wildlife and fisheries, will travel to Slovenia for six months where he will teach and conduct research on forest management at the University of Ljubljana and the Jozef Stefan Institute.

Maurice Stucke

• David Keffer, professor in the department of chemical and biomolecular engineering and director of the Sustainable Technology through Advanced Interdisciplinary Research (STAIR) program, will travel to Yonsei University in Seoul, Korea, for 10 months to teach a class on case studies in sustainability and a class on heat and mass transfer in fuel cells. Keffer also will research new avenues for carbon sequestration.

• Jeff Norrell, professor of history and Bernadotte Schmitt Chair of Excellence, has been appointed the Distinguished Chair in American Studies at the University of Tubingen in Germany for all next year. Norrell will lecture and write about American race relations in the 20th century.

• Maurice Stucke, an associate professor in the College of Law, will travel to the China Institute of Political Science and Law in Beijing, China, to lecture on antitrust this fall.

Since it was established in 1946, the Fulbright Program has provided more than 300,000 people with the opportunity to promote a mutual understanding between the U.S. and other countries. Administered by the Council for International Exchange, it operates in 155 countries worldwide.

UT Knoxville has two Fulbright representatives — Pia Wood, associate provost and director of the Center for International Education; and Alan Rutenberg, director of proposal development, in the Office of Research. A Fulbright information session is being held from 2 -3 p.m., on Monday, May 24 at the International House. Contact Bea Misch at bmisch@utk.edu if you wish to attend the session.

C O N T A C T :

Pia Wood (865-974-2173, pwood@utk.edu)

Kuck, of Bertrand, Neb., is researching the 20th century Latvian dictator Karlis Ulmanis for his dissertation. His Fulbright grant will enable him to spend nine months in Latvia where he will have access to historical archives. Kuck plans to return to UT Knoxville after his experience to teach and complete his Ph.D.

Tullock, of Riceville, Tenn., will graduate next month with a Bachelor of Arts in Russian. During his Fulbright year, he will teach English language classes and serve as an advisor to Russian teachers of English, experiences Tullock anticipates will help him with his future plans of teaching at the university level.

“Both Jordan and Alex had that ‘something extra’ that is takes to win nationally competitive awards like the Fulbright, “said Rebekah Page, assistant director of UT’s Office of National Scholarships and Fellowships. “Jordan’s research proposal was focused and well-planned, and he had made contacts in Latvia prior to applying. Alex’s essays highlighted his previous study abroad experience in Russia and spoke of the importance of cultural exchange. Both of them have strong language skills to back up their other impressive qualifications.”

Kuck advises future applicants to request feedback from different people on the application, a service Page said the Office of National Scholarships and Fellowships provides to applicants as well.

“Getting comments and suggestions from as many readers as possible is the key to producing a good proposal,” Kuck said.

Each year, the Fulbright U.S. Student Program provides full grants for graduate study or research and English teaching assistantships to approximately 1,500 U.S. students to over 140 countries worldwide.

Sponsored by the Department of State and named for the late Senator J. William Fulbright, the Fulbright Program was established by Congress in 1946 to “enable the government of the United States to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries.” In addition to the U.S Student Program, Fulbright also sponsors teaching and research awards for faculty and awards for international students to conduct graduate study at U.S. universities.

Applications for next year’s Fulbright U.S. Student Program competition become available on May 1, 2010. UT students must have their completed applications submitted by September 15, 2010.

Because the Fulbright program recommends beginning the application at least two months in advance of the deadline, UT students interested in applying for Fulbrights for the 2011-2012 year are encouraged to meet with someone in the Office of National Scholarships and Fellowships before the start of summer term.

—

C O N T A C T :

Rebekah Page (865-974-7875, rjpage@utk.edu)

“It’s very exciting. I’ve been to Africa before, but it’s a new country to work in,” Dewey said.

Previously, Dewey did most of his research in Zimbabwe. In Swaziland, Dewey will research the art of traditional Swazi blacksmiths and woodcarvers. This work will include interviewing the craftsmen about their art and how it is used in their culture.

“Most of my publications and scholarly work are focused on similar things, especially with Zimbabwe,” Dewey said. “In a way, this is a continuation, but with a new geographic focus.”

He plans also to assist museum staff with documentation and educational materials.

“They need a lot of help,” Dewey said. “I visited there last summer and Swaziland is a small country. It is about the size of New Jersey, with not very many resources.”

Swaziland only has one museum and it is frequently full of school children who want to learn more about their Swazi cultural heritage, Dewey said. He therefore proposed creating a brochure for both school children and tourists to learn more about the Swazi culture and traditions.

His research will coincide with his work at UT. He teaches classes about African art history, the African Diaspora and art made by the native peoples of the Pacific Islands and Australia. Dewey has curated many exhibitions on African art, including the 2003 exhibit at UT’s McClung Museum titled “The World Moves — We Follow: Celebrating African Art.”

“I really enjoy writing books, putting together catalogs and brochures” for art shows, Dewey said. “That’s my artistic expression.”