Fulbright Forum - Newsletter of the Fulbright Academy - June 2009
Contents
Update - 2008 Nursing Conference
in Doha
Update - 2010 Conference on
Sustainability
Institutional profile - University
of Denver, Colorado
Institutional profile - Barbados Community
College
The New Face of the Fulbright
Program
- Statistics on Student &
Faculty Fulbright Grants
Nursing Conference in Doha -
Selected Outcomes
In March 2008, the Qatar Foundation and
FAST hosted a three-day meeting on Human Health & Environmental
Challenges in the Middle East. Nearly 100 people attended,
including deans and leaders from Schools of Nursing and Health
Programs in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Yemen, Scotland,
California, and Washington. Staff and researchers from the US
Embassy, the European Union, UNESCO and the World Health
Organization also attended.
At the conclusion of the meeting,
the Qatar Foundation committed itself to increased funding for
epidemiology research and also expressed support for a regional
network of nursing/health professionals in the Middle East. A
meeting participant from San Francisco is at the American University
in Beirut this year, on a Fulbright grant, and we hope the
collaborations will continue. We also have been told that the Doha
meeting had an impact on discussions within the World Health
Organization.
A global group of nursing and health
professionals will be exploring further activities to strengthen the
nursing and health community in the Middle East, either at a meeting
in Beirut or at a workshop in conjunction with our 2010 Annual
Conference in San Francisco. Interested participants should
contact Eric Howard by replying to this newsletter.
Fifth Annual Conference - March
11-14, 2010
San Francisco, California will be
the location for the 5th Annual FAST Conference. Sustainability-Shaping
Tomorrow's Future Today" will feature presentations,
discussions and working sessions with some 250 Fulbright scholars
and scientists worldwide. We will be based at the Hilton (next to
the Transamerica Tower/Pyramid). As with our other conferences, the
program will include seminars, workshops and tours of science and
research facilities in the area. On your calendar, please reserve
March 11-14, 2010 (Thursday-Sunday).
"Sustainability" covers many
topics, including energy,
shelter & urban development, agriculture, information
technology, manufacturing and human security. Dozens of Fulbrighters from around the
world have volunteered to further refine the program and the
outcomes. Share your ideas by replying to this email
message.
Subsidiary meetings at other
locations around the world are also being planned. If you would like
to get special updates or are likely to attend, please click here and send your contact
information.
A gala opening night and special
activities will recognize five years of FAST collaborations with
other institutions - government agencies in several countries,
foundations, dozens of NGOs, universities and
corporations. Click here for the sponsorship/registration
pack.
Registration for the conference
will be $450, with discounts of up to 66% for certain communities of
alumni. Interested exhibitors and sponsors should contact FAST as
soon as possible. www.FulbrightAcademy.org.
Institutional Member
Profiles
The University of
Denver is the oldest and largest private university in the
Rocky Mountain region, with 5,384 undergraduates, 6,004 graduate
students and nearly 600 full-time appointed faculty members.
Fifty centers and institutes are based on the 125 acre campus,
conducting specialized research and scholarship in many fields.
The University of Denver often
has 3-4 students/year receiving Fulbright grants. Fulbright staff at DU include Dr. Gregg
Kvistad (Provost), Dr. Tom Farer (Dean, Korbel School of
International Relations), Dr. Joan Winn (Professor of Management,
Daniels College of Business) and many others at the university and
its affiliated colleges, centers and institutes. www.DU.edu.
Barbados Community College
is located near Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados. The
College has several divisions which provide education and training
to develop the human resources of this Caribbean island nation of
280,000 people. The Health Division, for example, offers associate
degree programs to train pharmacists, medical laboratory
technologists, nurses, environmental health inspectors,
rehabilitation therapist and health information managers. The
college also trains technicians to assist architects, building and
construction engineers, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers
and land surveyors, and it also offers majors in accounting,
economics, law, and government and political studies. The head of
the college, Gladstone Best, is one of some 200 citizens of Barbados
who have been Fulbright Scholars. An attendee at the 2007 FAST
conference in Panama, he studied education administration while on a
Fulbright to the University of Louisville, Kentucky in 1989. More
details can be found at www.bcc.edu.bb.
The New Face of the Fulbright
Program
FAST is an independent organization
started by the alumni of the Fulbright program, so we take a keen
interest in how the program is evolving. At a recent meeting in
Washington, the Council for International Exchange of Scholars
distributed statistics for the five year period 2004-2008. The
numbers show the new face of the four largest segments of the
Fulbright program and
help demonstrate that key
recommendations in the 1997 "Fulbright at Fifty" report have been
adopted.
One segment is US Students
going abroad. 1126 Fulbright grants to students in 2004,
growing to 1506 grants in 2008, with the top five receiving
countries in 2008 being Germany, South Korea, Spain, China and
Indonesia. 66% of recipients had a Bachelor’s degree, 16% had a
Master’s, and 17% were working toward their PhD. Top activity to
carry out while abroad: English Teaching Assistantships (507 of them
in 2008, or one-third of the grants). This was followed by four
science fields: Anthropology/ Sociology, Political Science, Public
Health, and Biology. 38% are male; 62% are female, and 11% of the
grants were awarded to African American and Hispanic American
students.
For Foreign Students
coming to the USA on a Fulbright, the number has grown from
1376 students in 2004 to 2182 in 2008. The top five sending
countries in 2008 were Germany, Pakistan, Chile, Indonesia and
Turkey. 57% had a Bachelor’s degree, 22% had a Master’s, and 19%
were working toward their PhD. Top activity to carry out while in
the USA: earning a professional degree, such as law, business
administration, public administration and public health. This was
followed by Sciences & Engineering, Social Sciences/Humanities,
and Computer Science. 55% are male; 45% are female.
The US Scholar
Program sends US faculty and professionals abroad.
One-third of the US participants are going abroad to lecture,
one-third lecture and do research, and one-third conduct research or
give a short seminar. The number of grants has been steady over the
five years: 820-830/year. The top receiving countries have been
Germany, China, Japan, India and Ireland. The Fulbright Specialist
Program offers short-term grants 2-6 weeks), and the top countries
for these grants are Russia, South Africa, Chile, Israel and Peru.
While the US Students are primarily female (62%), the US Scholars
are primarily male (59%).
Visiting Fulbright
Scholars are primarily in the USA to do research – 88.5% of
them. The number of grantees ranged from 732 to 822 during the five
year period. The top four countries sending Fulbrighters to the USA
were China, Spain, Russia and Argentina. The top fields are nearly
all in the sciences: Biological Sciences, Education, Engineering,
Medical Sciences, followed by two social sciences - Economics and
Political Science. The gender breakdown is identical to that of the
US Scholars: 59% male, 41% female.
STEM (science, technology,
engineering & math) fields were compared: 1998 versus
2008. In 1998, 20% of grants were in STEM fields; by 2007 it was
27%. Biological sciences rose from 19 grants in 1998 to 43 in 2008.
Engineering went up from 19 to 32 grants. Fields such as
Anthropology, Chemistry, Computer Science or IT, Environmental
Sciences, Geology, Medical Sciences or Public Health, and Physics
and Astronomy also showed gains.
The FAST definition of
“science” includes “social sciences” as well as STEM
fields. FAST also works with those who are interested in science and
technology fields but their Fulbright was for a professional degree
(such as business or law) or in an arts and humanities discipline.
The personal and professional interests of student grantees from
decades past may change. For example, the 22-year-old B.A. graduate
who earned a Fulbright in 1972 in the humanities is now 59 years old
and may be a middle-school science teacher, an executive in a
high-tech firm or a senior civil servant in a government
agency.
About FAST:
FAST is a non-partisan, non-profit
organization that serves Fulbright scholars and alumni -
executives, educators, and researchers worldwide. Our members and
sponsors include individuals and institutions such as universities,
corporations, government agencies and foundations.
Membership is open to institutions that support the FAST
mission and to individual Fulbright scholars and alumni, hosts of
scholars and friends of the Fulbright program.
FAST is an
independent organization and is not affiliated with or funded by the
Fulbright Exchange Program or the US Fulbright Association. Member
contributions are critical to our continued success. Please learn
more about the work of the Fulbright Academy by visiting our
website: www.FulbrightAcademy.org
If you have questions about
institutional or individual membership, please call FAST at
207-799-3098 or respond to this email.
Sincerely,
Eric Howard
Executive Director
