Speaker: AUP Provost Dr. Scott Sprenger.
What is the Fulbright ETA? Fulbright English Teaching Assistant (ETA) grants place recent graduates in classrooms abroad to provide assistance to local English teachers. ETA’s help teach English language while serving as cultural ambassadors for the U.S. During their grants, ETA’s teach 25-30 hours per week for 8-10 months in one of roughly 70 potential countries. The age and academic level of the students varies by country, ranging from kindergarten to university level.
The program facilitates cultural exchange through direct interaction on an individual basis in the classroom, field, home, and in routine tasks, allowing the grantee to gain an appreciation of others’ viewpoints and beliefs, the way they do things, and the way they think. Through engagement in the community, the individual will interact with their hosts on a one-to-one basis in an atmosphere of openness, academic integrity, and intellectual freedom, thereby promoting mutual understanding. Grant benefits include: Round-trip transportation to the host country; funding to cover room, board, and incidental costs, based on the cost of living in the host country; and Accident & Sickness-Health Benefits.
These grants are administered by the Fulbright Program, a portfolio of highly competitive, merit-based grants for international educational exchange for students, scholars, teachers, professionals, scientists and artists, founded by United States Senator J. William Fulbright in 1946. More than 325,000 Fulbrighters from over 155 countries have participated in the Fulbright Program since it began in 1946. Becoming a Fulbrighter means entering into a diverse community of accomplished individuals. The Fulbright Program is sponsored by the United States Department of State's, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
Who is eligible? Applicants must be U.S. citizens at the time of application. Permanent residents are not eligible. Applicants must have a conferred bachelor's degree or the equivalent before the start of the grant – no specific major is required. Requirements for proficiency in the language of the host country varies from country to country. Please review full eligibility and potential ineligibility issues here.
What is the application timeline? The 2016-2017 competition deadline is October 13, 2015 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time. AUP students apply as at-large candidates. Specific start dates and assignment lengths vary by host country based on the local academic calendar.
Want to know more? View tutorial (scroll to Tutorial number 3) and visit their website.