Around the World

Student Fulbright Scholarships

By UNC Asheville

July 14^th, 2020

Dozens of UNC Asheville students and alumni have taken their education global and traveled the world on a prestigious Fulbright Scholarship. Read about their adventures in their own words, and drop us a line at alumni@unca.edu if you're a UNC Asheville Fulbright alum with a story (and maybe a great photo or two) to share!

Elizabeth Cavanaugh '80

I taught English at a French high school in Arras, France. During my 1980-1981 academic year there, I also studied dance at the Théâtre d’Arras. In this photo, I am on the far left of the top row, together with a few of my English conversation students in the Arras classroom.

Returning to the U.S., I stepped into the French language classroom of a Pasadena, California independent high school, where I created new lessons and assisted teachers and students as a guest teacher. I had also been contributing newspaper and magazine stories on nature, culture, and the arts. Now, I am editing my recently completed first novel.

Elizabeth Underwood '01

I went to Germany, Poland and France in 2013 on a Fulbright for International Education Administrators (IEA). It was for higher education administrators from the USA to learn more about European and specifically German higher education.

Susan Anderson '78

My Fulbright grant was for post-BA study in Germany. I spent the 1978-79 academic year at the University of Saarbrücken in Saarbrücken, Germany, on the border to France. I took classes at the university, improved my German proficiency, made friends with whom I am still in contact, and learned an enormous amount about German culture, literature, and history. This experience enabled me to be successful in graduate school. I studied German literature at UNC-Chapel Hill from 1979 until 1985, when I graduated with a Ph.D. I now work (since 1986) as a professor of German at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, in the Department of German and Scandinavian. I will always be grateful to Dr. Henry Stern, who supported my Fulbright application and who, along with Dr. Gullickson, taught me German at UNCA. Dr. Stern, Dr. Gullickson, the Drs. Cranston (French), and Dr. Andrade (Spanish) all inspired me with their enthusiasm for teaching and for the joys of learning about international languages and cultures. I served for a while on the University of Oregon’s Fulbright selection committee and have encouraged numerous students to pursue study abroad.

Annelise Hagedorn ‘12

I did the Fulbright English Teaching Assistant program in 2012-2013 in Sri Lanka. I worked at Sujatha Vidyalaya, teaching English to 6th and 7th grade girls.

I currently live in WNC, and I am an instructor of Sociology at Blue Ridge Community College.

Kyle Cavignini '14

I completed my 2014-2015 Fulbright Research Fellowship in Norway, where I worked in with Dr. Clive Bramham in the Department of Neuroscience at the University of Bergen. I was part of a research project that sought to understand molecular components that control synaptic plasticity. Specifically, I studied how molecular growth signals (neurotrophins) cause Arc, a protein “master switch” for synaptic plasticity, to interact with other proteins used in molecular cargo transport. Misregulation of Arc in implicated in several neurological disorders, including Alzheimer’s and Fragile X syndrome. Understanding the biochemical interactions that control Arc provides insight into the molecular basis for these conditions. The research was published in the journal Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience in 2017.

I am currently in the 5th year of my Ph.D. in Biological Chemistry at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. My thesis research seeks to better understand how the liver responds to metabolic stress, such as injury to mitochondria or high fat content, at the genetic level to initiate molecular compensation responses. When I complete my degree I hope to combine my scientific training and my background in liberal arts to pursue a career in science policy and bioethics.

Carlton Murrey '94

My Fulbright Scholarship took me (and my wife Jennifer) to Münster, Germany from fall 1994 - spring 1995. I researched the life of Cardinal Clemens August Graf von Galen, an outspoken opponent of National Socialist policies during the 1930s and 1940s. My research included archival research and oral documentation based on interviews with individuals who personally knew Cardinal Galen, including a niece and altar server.

Jennifer and I have 8 children (ages 8 to 22, including 13 year old identical twins), and we live on a small farm in Mills River, NC where we keep chickens and bees. I am a Wealth Management Advisor for J. Biance Financial. Jennifer is a music and theater teacher for Canongate Catholic High School, as well as the youth choir director at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Tryon, NC.

Hannah Dysart Clark '14

I went to Düsseldorf in North Rhein-Westphalia, Germany for my Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship. I worked as a teaching assistant at the Goethe Gymnasium, a 5th-13th grade university-prep school.

I travelled to many places during my time abroad. I went to Italy for two weeks and worked on a small farm in Tuscania that specialized in organic foods and cultivating olive trees. I visited Berlin several times, as it's a classic travel destination in Germany with unparalleled art culture. I made weekend trips to Bergen, Norway to visit another UNCA Fulbright scholar, and to Madrid, Spain. I visited the famous thermal bath houses in Baden-Baden, Germany and celebrated Karneval in Cologne and Düsseldorf (it's one of the biggest Carnival celebrations in the world, they close the cities down to celebrate!).

I currently live in Lawrence, Kansas and am pursuing my Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Kansas.

Erwin Cook '81

I had two fellowships administered by the Fulbright program. The first was a Swiss Universities Grant, awarded while I was at UNCA, which enabled me to study under Professor Walter Burkert at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. The second was a Deutsche Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) Fellowship, awarded while I was at UC-Berkeley, which enabled me to write my Ph.D. dissertation on the Homeric Odyssey under Professor Wolfgang Kullmann at the University of Freiburg, Germany. I am now the Murchison Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at Trinity University, San Antonio TX. Before that I was a professor of Classics with a zero-time appointment in the Comparative Literature Program at UT-Austin. I am currently writing a commentary on the first four books of the Iliad for a complete new edition to be published by the Lorenzo Valla Foundation in Turin, Italy:

Omero Iliade. Vol. 1, Libri I-IV. A cura di Erwin Cook. Traduzione di Piero Boitani. Giulio Guidorizzi ed. gen. Torino: Fondazione Lorenzo Valla. (In preparation, with scheduled publication date of 2021).

Pete Kekenes-Huskey '01

Kekenes-Huskey spent three weeks in Regensburg, Germany for language training, and then a year in Berlin at the Freie Universitat for research in computer-based chemistry. He also traveled quite extensively in eastern Europe.

In 2020 he moved to Chicago, where he is an associate professor in physiology at Loyola University. Prior to that, he was an assistant professor of chemistry at the University of Kentucky.

Gray Barrett '16

I took part in a Fulbright Student Program.

I completed my Fulbright grant in Norway from 2016-2017, in which I took master's classes at the Norwegian Center for Human Rights and researched at the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO). I also got the chance to travel to Belgium and Luxembourg as part of a Fulbright-EU-NATO trip, which took many Fulbrighters from all across Europe and taught us about Europe's vital security and governing bodies.

Now, I'm a conflict data analyst for the U.S. Department of State, where I focus on mass atrocity prevention as well as mapping and monitoring instability due to violent conflict and human rights abuses. I live in Washington, DC.

Jeff Chandler '87

I attended the University of Zürich in Switzerland. I continued studying Classics (Altphilologie, in German) just as I had at UNCA.

Currently, I live in Charlotte, NC. I was employed, full time, at Microsoft, here in Charlotte, as a Technical Support Engineer. I was also, part time, adjunct faculty at UNC Charlotte, where I taught introductory Latin and Greek I & II, and occasionally, Classical Mythology.