Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching and Fulbright Classroom Teacher Exchange 
Alumni

As Fulbright alumni, you are part of a unique community that has crossed cultural and geographic boundaries to share your knowledge with the world. Now that your grant is complete, you may be wondering how you can remain connected to the program and increase the impact of your experience abroad by sharing it with others.

Alumni are invited to become a part of the Department of State’s alumni website, an online community which serves as a professional support network for the nearly 300,000 Fulbright alumni worldwide.

You may also wish to join the Fulbright Association, or one of its local chapters.

Another way to educate others about the program is by sharing your story with us. We encourage you to contact us directly so that we may feature your stories on the web and in other publicity materials like our annual report, flyers and newsletters. Please contact IIE at  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  or  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.  to tell us your story.

Fulbright Teacher Alumni Grant Application

Alumni of either the Fulbright Classroom Teacher Exchange Program or the Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching Program may apply for funding through the Alumni Grants Program. The purpose of the Alumni Grants Program is to provide support to Fulbright Teacher Exchange alumni who wish to extend the Fulbright experience to their school and/or community through student exchanges, joint curriculum projects, electronic linkages or other projects of the teachers’ design. Please read the Alumni Grant Program application to learn more about the program.

If you are interested in applying for the alumni grant, please read through the following alumni grant samples for both programs to learn more about how alumni are using the funds to build upon their Fulbright experience:

Fulbright Classroom Teacher Exchange Program Alumni Grant Samples
Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching Program Alumni Grant Samples
 

Fulbright Classroom Teacher Exchange Program Alumni Grant Samples

Common Core Collaboration by Anne Juola-Rushton, (U.S. to UK, 2010-2011)

Juola-Rushton’s program will focus on leadership and management for all levels of curriculum in the U.S. and UK. Her project started August 2012 and will conclude at the end of November 2012. She plans to collaborate with 12 UK teachers at St. James’ Primary School in Chorley, England to study key components of the UK’s OFSTED report and share information on the United States’ newly developed Common Core Standards. Juola-Rushton will work with school board members, teachers and administrators and plans to shadow select UK teachers on implementation of the UK’s national curriculum. Meeting with teachers and administrators will allow Juola-Rushton to evaluate the quality of standards of teaching. She will return to her school in Florida and share these best practices with her school district’s common core curricular design teams. The results from the project will also be shared at a regional level, as she plans to present her findings at the National Council of Teachers of English conference in Las Vegas, NV in November 2012.

 How to Lead a Globally Sustainable Life by Suzanne Mayer (U.S. to India, 2011-2012)

Mayer’s project is designed to help students develop a deeper understanding of “sustainability” and how choices affect our global world. The project will connect her 8^th grade classroom in Seattle, WA with 8^th grade students in Delhi, India via technology. Students will investigate a range of sustainability issues and collect data from both parts of the world. The students will then analyze the data, create a presentation based on their findings and share their findings with their counterparts via the iEARN network. Mayer seeks to encourage students to build on their mathematics knowledge while also using critical thinking, problem-solving and collaboration. She plans to share this project with other teachers in her school community to support the project now and in future years. Mayer will also share the curriculum, assessments and classroom materials throughout her district.

 Marrakech-Concord Express by Jeanne Windsor (U.S. to Morocco 2007-2008; France 1977-1978)

Windsor seeks to build upon a virtual exchange project developed with her exchange partner, Noureddine Kahlaouy. Since their Fulbright Teacher Exchange, the two teachers and their classrooms have stayed connected through blogs and Skype sessions. Both exchange teachers would like to develop this cross-cultural language project further. Windsor and Kahlaouy will meet first in the U.S. to develop a common curriculum and create interactive multimedia online exercises. This will allow the teachers and students to better communicate via Skype. The teachers will then travel to Marrakech to construct an audio-video facility in Kahlaouy’s school, thus improving functionality. They will continue to develop the common curriculum with resources from the Moroccan school. Their work can be shared through the online forums, VoiceThread and LingtLanguage. Windsor will also present their work at a regional conference of World Languages teachers in New England.
 

Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching Program Alumni Grant Samples

LGBT Inclusion in Mexico by Ileana Jiménez (U.S. to Mexico, 2010-2011)

During her Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching Program in 2011, Ileana Jiménez researched issues of bullying and harassment with LGBT students in Mexico City’s university high school system. During her program, she provided workshops to local schools on LGBT inclusion, delivered keynote speeches at the first international conference on bullying hosted by Mexico City’s Secretary of Education and provided workshops on how to create safe schools for all students. In summer 2012, Ileana utilized an alumni grant to return to Mexico to continue the work begun while on her Fulbright program with her host university colleagues and to share her research with Mexican organizations who work with LGBT youth. Her alumni activities involved working with educational leaders in local schools to help implement LGBT-friendly curriculum and policies into their schools; giving presentations about her capstone project results, and working with school and university contacts to develop avenues for continued collaboration. While in Mexico, Jimenez was invited to publish her capstone project results in her Mexican host school’s academic journal, Logos. She will continue to disseminate her work by presenting at several upcoming educational conferences.

Course Development and Community Outreach by Terence Gilheany (U.S. to Israel, 2011-2012)

Terence Gilheany’s alumni grant project goals are to educate U.S. students and community members about religion and politics using case studies developed as part of his Distinguished Fulbright Awards in Teaching Program experience in Israel. In Israel, Terence explored religious studies in both Israeli and Palestinian schools. In August 2012, Gilheany used his Fulbright alumni grant funds to develop a new elective course for his U.S. school’s religion department called “Religion and Politics,” which he will teach during the 2012-2013 school year. Through his course, Terence will challenge his students to develop their own viewpoints on how religion and politics relate to each other and to think critically about these issues. In addition, he plans to use alumni grant funds to develop an interactive presentation based on his Fulbright research which he will share with other teachers to raise awareness about how teaching religion can be used to decrease prejudicial beliefs among students. This project will build upon his Fulbright capstone project and will allow him to explore his experiences from a new perspective after receiving feedback from students and community members.