Student Grant & Award Initiative Fulbright Application Support
The CGU campus deadline for Fulbright applications is September 10, 2024.
Please see the information below for all of the events and services we have planned to support CGU student applications for the 2024-2025 cycle.
Fulbright Application Resources
View Past CGU Fulbright Winners Here
Producing a Strong Fulbright Application
A strong Fulbright application begins with a thorough consideration of why you want to go abroad and then an appropriate choice of the potential host country. From there, it requires close attention to detail as well as the commitment to draft, revise, and revise again. For the application materials to reflect who you are and why Fulbright is the next logical step in your academic, artistic, or professional trajectory, you must be willing to spend the time to improve it over numerous iterations with the help of multiple perspectives of feedback. Please begin by reviewing our materials and making a one-on-one appointment with Rebecca Donaldson, the CGU Fulbright Program Assistant (rebecca.donaldson@cgu.edu).
Below you will find a timeline, some helpful questionnaires to guide your thinking through the application, the Student Grant & Award Initiative’s scheduled events and staff, and some tips on the affiliation letter. If you have any questions about any of this, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at studentgrants@cgu.edu, or by making an appointment!
Timeline
March – June 2023
- Fulbright Applications open on April 5th
- Choose a country & study its Fulbright requirements
- Review previous application samples & other resource material (email studentgrants@cgu.edu for access)
- Meet with the Student Grant & Award Initiative Program Assistant
- Meet with your faculty mentor (if doing research/study grant)
- Draft and send your affiliation letter (if doing research/study grant)
- Receive application draft feedback from initiative staff and the Center for Writing & Rhetoric
- Attend Fulbright webinars
July & August 2023
- Continue revising and polishing the application via feedback
- If you haven’t yet, draft and send your affiliation letter (if doing research/study grant–early July at the latest!)
- Attend Fulbright webinars
- Receive feedback from initiative staff and your faculty advisor
September 2023
- Polish application final draft & submit on the Fulbright portal by the campus deadline: September 10, 2024
- Interviews with the CGU Fulbright Review Committee mid-September
- National Deadline: October 8th at 5 pm EST
Fulbright Events
2024 Webinars
Full lineup coming soon!
Past Webinars
- Fulbright Webinar hosted by Fulbright & the Institute of International Education (IEE): Tuesday, March 28, 2023, at 11am (Register HERE!)
During this virtual event, Fulbright and the IEE will cover the Fulbright application process. This event is open to all individuals at U.S. institutions who are interested in applying for a Fulbright grant. Students will learn about the countries offering awards, the types of Fulbright grants, and the timeline for submitting application materials. Students will then be placed into breakout rooms with representatives from their institutions to learn more about the process and have their individual questions answered. Representatives from CGU will be available.
- Writing a Grant Proposal: Thursday, May 11, 2023, at 12pm (Register HERE!)
During this virtual event, Rebecca will cover how to write a grant proposal for Fulbright. She will outline what is to be included in the 2-page document, including the who, what, where, why, and how of what students are proposing for their Fulbright grant.
- Choosing a Host Country & Securing a Letter of Affiliation: Thursday, May 18, 2023, at 12pm (Register HERE!)
During this virtual event, Rebecca will help students select a country to apply to and discuss how to secure a letter of affiliation from a host institution. Rebecca will cover the different awards available to each country and support students in selecting an appropriate award to apply for.
- Writing the Personal Statement: Thursday, June 8, 2023, at 12pm (Register HERE!)
During this virtual event, Rebecca will discuss how to write a personal statement for Fulbright. She will discuss how to create a 1-page narrative that provides a unique and clear picture of the person applying.
- Fulbright Writing Session: Thursday, August 3, 2023, at 12pm (Register HERE!)
During this two-hour session, students will join Rebecca for quiet writing time. Students will be encouraged to work on their Personal Statement, Statement of Grant Proposal, or short essay responses for their Fulbright application. Break-out rooms will be provided to answer any questions.
- Completing the Fulbright Application: Thursday, August 17, 2023, at 12pm (Register HERE!)
In this 1-hour webinar, students will be provided with instruction on how to complete their Fulbright application, with focus on finalizing their abstract/summary page and answering questions pertaining to host country engagement and plans upon return to the U.S.
- Fulbright Roundtable: Thursday, October 19, 2023 at 12 pm (Register HERE!)
Interested in potentially applying for a Fulbright award? Want to hear about the experience of past winners and learn tips about producing the best application possible? During this 1-hour webinar, students will have the opportunity to meet former Fulbright scholars and learn about their Fulbright experiences. These Fulbright alumni include CGU students, former Fulbright ETAs, former Fulbright research scholars, and international Fulbright scholars. This is an incredible opportunity to see if applying for a Fulbright is a good fit for you!
Affiliation Letters
Applicants for research/study awards are required to obtain an affiliation letter from the institution that is going to support their project in the country. Fulbright provides some helpful guidance on finding affiliates, and Amherst has made helpful guides for initial emails for both the research and study tracks as well as templates for the actual research and study affiliation letters. The letter templates might be helpful to provide to potential affiliates before they write their letters. You may submit up to three letters.
Student Grant & Award Initiative Fulbright Staff
Rebecca Donaldson, Program Assistant
Rebecca Donaldson serves as the Program Assistant for the Student Grant & Award Initiative at CGU and works directly with students applying for Fulbright awards. She is a PhD student in Positive Developmental Psychology and a member of the Youth Development Evaluation Lab. In 2014, Rebecca was awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she taught English phonetics and phonology courses at the Universidade do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ).
Dr. Marcus Weakley, Director, Center for Writing & Rhetoric & Co-Chair, Student Grant & Award Initiative
Marcus Weakley, Ph.D. is the director of the Center for Writing & Rhetoric (CWR) at Claremont Graduate University. He has been working in writing centers since 2013 and has taught writing since 2014. During this time, he has worked at the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as in both Writing in the Disciplines and Writing Across the Curriculum contexts. He is a firm believer that writing is a critical element of graduate education and works to ensure that the Center is prepared to instruct and support CGU’s graduate students at all stages of their degrees. Grant writing is one of a number of areas the CWR has expanded into to provide comprehensive writing and presenting support to CGU students.
Dr. Eusebio Alvaro, Full Research Professor & Co-Chair, Student Grant & Award Initiative
Eusebio Alvaro is a full research professor in the Division of Behavioral & Organizational Sciences at Claremont Graduate University and directs the Arizona office of the Institute of Organizational and Program Evaluation Research. His basic research centers on the study of social influence processes with an emphasis on biased message processing, resistance to persuasion, indirect effects of persuasive messages, and mechanisms by which minorities can achieve change. His applied research and evaluation activities involve studying persuasion in the context of health promotion, disease prevention, and medicine with a particular focus on the development and testing of mass media messages targeting health behavior change.
Alvaro received a PhD in Communication (specializing in social influence) and an MPH in Health Education and promotion from the University of Arizona. He has served as director of the Health Informatics Program in the Center for the Management of Information at the University of Arizona and director of the Health Communication Research Office at the Arizona Cancer Center. He is funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, and other organizations.
Alvaro’s current work involves the evaluation of mass media and community outreach efforts to promote organ donation in both the general population and among Hispanics. These projects have a theoretical basis in work regarding the attitude–behavior relationship and are designed to assess efforts at transforming positive organ donation attitudes into organ donation behavior. He also works with William Crano in developing and assessing the impact of drug prevention messages for adolescents. Alvaro has a strong commitment to interdisciplinary research and has published in the fields of psychology, communication, public health, and medicine.
At CGU, Alvaro regularly teaches the course Quasi-Experimental Methods, as well as core health psychology courses, including Overview of Applied Health Psychology, Health Psychology Research and Measures, Health Promotion, and Survey of Health Behavior Theory.