Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship Archives - Page 2 of 11

Check Out the Updated Fulbright U.S. Student Program Tutorials!

March 15, 2017

Our Fulbright U.S. Student Program tutorials have been updated for the 2018-2019 application cycle, which opens on April 3.

The tutorials are up-to-date, online slideshow videos designed for applicants and Fulbright Program Advisers (FPAs) to learn about program and application basics. Since some tutorials may be a prerequisite for attending webinars, we recommend that Fulbright applicants and FPAs review them before registering. We hope you find them useful and informative!

To listen to and watch our tutorials, click on the General Overview Tutorial below and here.

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U.S. Fulbright

Athletic Training

September 8, 2016

Teaching numbers: Christina Galardi, 2012-2013, Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to South Korea, teaches a captive audience a counting lesson in English as part of an early childhood cognitive development program through iFuture at the University of Ulsan. Ulsan, South Korea

I’m staring at an IQ test with fear that my hard-earned college GPA will be put to shame.

During my winter break from my Fulbright English Teaching Assistant position, I worked for a month with a Korean professor who previously pursued a Fulbright grant in the United States with a venture company that develops child cognitive development programs. I started by taking the same diagnostic test used to assess children.

Thankfully, my test anxiety was resolved by a satisfactory score. The professor then handed me some research articles to familiarize myself with the Feuerstein Instrumental Enrichment Program used by the company. As I sat down with the texts, I blew the dust from my academic machinery and flexed my intellectual muscles.

In a few months, I will lift the scholastic heavyweights again to pursue a master’s degree in public health following my return home to the United States. Perhaps it will take a little while to get back into my routine, but I don’t think my mental force will have atrophied.

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U.S. Fulbright

Don’t Play the Game. The Odds Are Not in Your Favor!

August 15, 2016

Mary Ogunrinde, 2014-2015, Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to the Dominican Republic, in the classroom

Don’t play the game. The odds are not in your favor. I say this because I began and completed my application for a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship during the last three weeks of the 2013 application cycle. I applied to teach in the Dominican Republic. I wasn’t trying to start the process so late. I started graduate school in August of that year and learned about the Fulbright U.S. Student Program as I was looking for scholarships on the Internet. I spent the first month of graduate school looking for a Fulbright Program Adviser on my campus and it turned out there wasn’t one. By this time, it was already September and the application was due by the second week of October.

As I worked on my Statement of Grant Purpose and Personal Statement, I scoured the Internet for information about previous Fulbrighters, their experiences, their essays, their credentials, et cetera. That’s when I began to play the game: The comparison game. I began to lose some of confidence in my ability to prove to Fulbright application reviewers that I was worthy of a grant. These Fulbrighters had pages of credentials. They seemed to be on their way to winning a Nobel Prize. Here I was a first semester graduate student with a resume that contained mostly volunteer work from my undergrad and no leadership position in any organization. I didn’t graduate Summa Cum Laude. I was not saving the lives of orphans in Africa or building wells in India. I was sitting in St. Petersburg, Florida, trying not to get lost, make wrong turns on to the numerous one-way streets and get myself killed in an accident.

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U.S. Fulbright

Open the Door and People Will Enter

July 6, 2016

Corey Fayne, 2015-2016, Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to South Korea

In partnership with Reach the World (RTW), the Fulbright U.S. Student Program is publishing a series of articles written by Fulbright English Teaching Assistants participating in Reach the World’s Traveler correspondents program, which through its interactive website, enriches the curriculum of elementary and secondary classrooms (primarily located in New York City but also nationwide) by connecting them to the experiences of volunteer Fulbright English Teaching Assistants (ETAs) and other world travelers who are currently studying and living abroad.

When I think about where I come from, I think about the diverse neighborhood I grew up in, the different types of ethnic cuisines I could try, and the ‘corn man’ ringing his bell, so my sisters and I could eat some delicious Mexican-style cucumbers! Although the current neighborhood I live in South Korea as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant is not as diverse as my hometown, Chicago, I still feel at home because of my homestay family’s open arms.

Living away from home for a long time is like eating pancakes every morning for three weeks without syrup. It is not easy. It also means that you do not get to hang out with your close friends, eat certain foods that you are used to, or, perhaps, speak the language you are most comfortable with. It is scary. But even this difficulty and fear can bring about growth and a better sense of awareness.

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U.S. Fulbright

Alumni Perspective: Wesołych Świąt (Merry Christmas) from Poland!

June 27, 2016

Dani Francuz Rose, 2015-2016, Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to Poland, presenting to a group of local high school students visiting the American Corner

My husband Tucker and I (both from Georgia State University) have now been in Poland for over three months. We are here as Fulbright English Teaching Assistants and are located in the city of Łódź, in central Poland. During our time here, I am responsible for teaching several classes in the English Philology department at the University of Łódź. In addition to teaching, I am also involved in a weekly conversation club at the American Corner in Łódź and have been able to visit several other schools in the area to give presentations about American culture and the English language. Through these programs and in our daily lives in Poland, we are continuously learning about the people, the culture, and the language of our host country. We also have the unique opportunity to see how people in Poland celebrate the holidays all throughout the year.

Thus far, we have been through several, major Polish holidays, such as All Saint’s Day (a time to remember and celebrate the lives of family members who have passed away) and Andrzejki (a gathering for friends, family, and fortune-telling). We have also shared our American customs for holidays like Thanksgiving as presentations, conversation topics at the American Corner, and in everyday conversations with our new colleagues and friends. However, Christmas is the first holiday that we have in common. And it is a big one.

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U.S. Fulbright

Through ‘Racialeyes’: A Brazilian Perspective through Media and Storytelling

June 1, 2016

Mia Yamashiro (left), Laura Li (right), 2014-2015, Fulbright Teaching Assistants to Brazil, presenting at the Fulbright Mid-Year Seminar in São Paulo

When I decided to apply for a Fulbright U.S. Student grant, I chose Brazil, and in particular, Curitiba, because of its strong Asian-Brazilian community. I thought that my Japanese-Okinawan heritage and cultural background would be a way to connect with Curitibanos. Yet I quickly realized that instead of creating connections, it often made me feel isolated.

It was difficult adjusting to the racial climate of Brazil where, in stark contrast to the United States, people are not very sensitized to race issues. For example, people pulled their eyes at me as a way to tease me or establish familiarity with me, like, “You’re Japa,right?” (pulls eyes). People asked Laura, who is Chinese-American, if she was my sister. Men on the street cat called me, yelling “Japa!” and touched my hair.

So Laura and I decided to give voice to these racial issues by creating Racialeyes, a project dedicated to further understanding the Asian-Brazilian community in Curitiba, Paraná. Our project was born out of the desire to dispel harmful stereotypes and educate people about the diversity and richness of the Asian diaspora in Brazil. While eyes are often pulled back at us to mark us as “other,” this project seeks to re-appropriate our racialized eyes, diversify the dialogue about Asian-Brazilians, and make us question our instinct to mark different as “other.”

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