|
Featured Fulbrighter - Parul Zaveri
Friday, March 10, 2006
Category: Featured Fulbrighters
|
|
My Fulbright ExperienceI am Parul Zaveri, Fulbright Scholar in Library and Information Science from India. At present I am at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. My Fulbright program is of six months which started on 09/22/2005 and will end on 03/21/2006. Well this is my first visit to America and before coming I tried to get as much information as possible so that my stay would be comfortable and I would not have any problems. I don’t think I faced any major problems so far. My experience, I would like to divide into Academic Experience and Social- Cultural Experience.
Academic ExperienceI am at one of the best university of America and it has the third largest University Library with approximately ten million documents. Access to electronic resources online from anywhere helps to access information from the library at any time of the day. The University has very good infrastructure facilities which help students and scholars to pursue their studies and do their research. There is lot of stress on self learning method and weekly assignments keep the students up-to-date with latest information in the subject. Also students have lot of options to choose subjects from, which gives them specialization in specific area. Most of the students I met in Library and Information Science have some kind internship which supports them in their tuition fees etc. I liked the teaching –learning method very much which is not only class room based but also lot of project work and of course online learning. Also the University has very good facilities for physically disabled people. Mine is a non-degree Fulbright program so I was not pressurized for assignment, but courses which I attended has completely given me a new idea and I am sure it will help me in my teaching in India. Also I had chance to visit so many libraries and it really has been a wonderful experience to see different kinds of libraries which includes Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library at Springfield and Library of Congress at Washington Dc.
My personal experience with people here has been very good. I have been able to meet so many people in my field and they have been very cooperative. I feel if you know what you want then you can gain maximum knowledge here.
Social-Cultural ExperienceThere is a lot of cultural, social and infrastructural difference than my country, but academic experience has been great and I am sure that will be beneficial to my institution and country. I have a very nice neighbor Denise, who has been very supportive and has been very helpful. Only one thing I felt was loneliness and homesickness sometimes. Apart from studies I went for lot of picnics and I had lot of fun also. My eating habits, dressing had been totally different, but I could get most of the food items. Being vegetarian, I had certain limitations, but it was manageable. And of course how can I forget weather, everybody had scared me about harsh winter, but I think I am lucky, it has not been very harsh winter so far, but I very much enjoyed snowfall, which never happens in my place Mumbai, India.
My Fulbright enrichment seminar at Washington DC was well organized and the team also got ready for any crisis due to heavy snow fall. It was a fantastic team effort. The topics chosen were interesting and all speakers were very good and could hold attention of the audience till last minute. I think idea of panel discussion was good and it also gave chance to fulbrighters to participate in the discussion. The School visit, NGO visit was informative and boat party was entertaining. Also the host visit was really well planned as I came to know that my host had been to India as part of their foreign service and it was really homely feeling while talking to them.
In short if I have to say, I would say that it has been a great experience for me academically and I would definitely like to come back if I get opportunity in future. I wish my Fulbright program had a longer duration than six months.
Parul Zaveri
Fulbright Scholar
University of Illinois
Urbana-Champaign
Illinois
Senior Lecturer
SHPT School of Library Science
SNDT Women’s University
Mumbai
India
Email: parulzaveri2004@yahoo.co.in
|
|
|
