ABOUT FULBRIGHT

Fulbright Program: U.S. Applicant Podcast

Transcript For: Jonathan Akeley, Manager East Asia

Jonathan Akeley, Manager East Asia, discusses recent developments in the Fulbright program in the regions.

Schuyler:          Hi and welcome to the US Applicant Fulbright Podcast. I’m here with

Jonathan:          Jonathan Akeley

Schuyler:          Who is the area manager for

Jonathan:          East Asia and the Pacific Region.

Schuyler:          And, Jonathan is going to share with us some new developments and some basic information that might be useful to you if you’re considering applying to any countries in East Asia. Jonathan…

Jonathan:          Alright, well, one of the biggest developments in the Asia Pacific region recently has been the increase in the number of English Teaching Assistantship programs. And, this year we have, I think, two new programs in the Asia Pacific region, one in Macau and one in Vietnam.

Tony:                Specifically for English Teaching Assistants?

Jonathan:          Specifically for English Teaching Assistants.

Schuyler:          And how many grants are being offered in each of those countries?

Jonathan:          Vietnam is going to be 10 and Macau is about 9. Those numbers can fluctuate year to year, but that’s how much we anticipate right now.

Schuyler:          That’s exciting.

Tony:                And what level of English? Are they going to be in elementary schools, universities, or…?

Jonathan:          It depends. Actually both in Macau and Vietnam it’s going to be at the university level, colleges and universities.

Tony:                OK, so what kind of candidates are you looking for specifically within the ETA program for these countries?

Jonathan:          The English Teaching Assistantship programs in East Asia are pretty open. None of the ETA programs in Asia require any prior knowledge of the local language, so it’s very much open. And the most important thing is they want people who are open to the experience of getting immersed in the local culture and really learning about what the educational and cultural environment is like in the country that they’re going to.

Tony:                Great.

Schuyler:          OK, so you were talking about the English Teaching Assistantships and where are the bulk of those applications going at the moment, in that region?

Tony:                Or grants, right?

Jonathan:          The bulk? Well, the largest ETA program in East Asia is in Korea where they have about 70 awards each year both at the secondary school level and primary school level. But the second most popular country, or location, in terms of applications was actually Hong Kong this past year, where we received somewhere around 130 applications-

Schuyler:          Wow.

Tony:                For how many spots?

Jonathan:          where they were only offering around 20 grants. And that was the first year that the program was offered in Hong Kong.

Schuyler:          And as far as Macau, just sort of back tracking a little bit to Macau and Vietnam, although we say for the English Teaching Assistantships that there are no language requirements for the native language that’s spoken in the country, what if I wanted to learn, and I’m in a region or part of the country, US where it’s hard to learn a language that’s maybe not sort of the basic European Spanish, French, German, how would I go about just getting a hospitality level of any of the languages that are spoken in Vietnam or Macau.

Tony:                Or, for example, Indonesia.

Schuyler:          Exactly. How would I go about doing that?

Jonathan:          That’s very good question. Well, again, for the English Teaching Assistantship programs that’s not really an issue because the language ability’s not required. For someone who is actually proposing to do research or study in a country then it does become more of an issue and there are a bunch of countries that do have language requirements. You know, a lot of schools, even if a person doesn’t have access to classes in a language like Vietnamese or Bahasa Indonesia, there are still students on the campus that might be from Vietnam or might be from Indonesia. And we have had people in the past who will arrange tutoring set ups with graduate students or just classmates that they have who are native speakers of the language. And that at least gives them some skill in the language before they begin their grants.

Tony:                I had one more question related to the English Teaching Assistantships which I’m sure you get a lot of phone calls or emails about. Let’s say you have an applicant that’s interested in possibly 2 countries, let’s say Macau and Vietnam, and in this example to teach English. What is the general advice you’d give someone who is applying for the English Teaching Assistantships to this region, for example? Should they play the numbers game, or should they really get a sense of, you know-

Jonathan:          I always discourage, I hate the numbers game. I think a person has to go where they are most, where they feel most compelled to go and where they’re most interested in going. And if they don’t know much about the cultures in Macau or in Vietnam then they should do research on it. They are distinct countries and do have very unique cultures. And they should find out which one appeals more to them, and then, you know, go for that country if they’re really that much up in the air.

Tony:                Great.

Schuyler:          So, OK, switching gears here a little bit, let’s say I was going to do a research grant in one of these countries and I was looking to establish an affiliation. And, again, you know, I’m new to this whole application process. What advice would you give me in terms of just beginning to do some research on establishing affiliation?

Jonathan:          Establishing affiliation is probably the toughest part of putting together the application because a lot of times people are just going off these shots in the dark and trying to figure out where best to base their projects. People’s first reflex I think is to go to the internet because it’s the easiest, and the path of least resistance in terms of just looking- I can google something, pull up information. But a lot of times the best information will really come from advisors at their home institution who have expertise in the region. And even if they don’t necessarily have contacts who are doing research in the same field, they will know people to introduce them to and it’s kind of like the chain of contacts. Or even if they don’t know an individual or a professor they might know the best institution or things like that. I think that a lot of students don’t take advantage of that resource that they have there on their campuses and I think that’s an important place to start.

Schuyler:          I think the subtext in what you’re saying too is to start early. If you’re going to follow this chain of connections and professors knowing professors, and one person knowing another that takes some time to establish.

Jonathan:          With affiliations, I mean, you’re never going to get an affiliation from half way around the world in a week’s time. It’s going to take a couple of months to really suss things out and really get a good letter.

                        Programs in Asia are open to all fields of study. We tend to follow the classic, most popular fields of study. The Fulbright program does: history, public health. Those are kind of the top fields and then it drops off precipitously after those two. We have a real dearth of applications in the arts and it really would be nice because obviously Asia has an enormous population and is very rich in the arts but Americans tend to focus on particularly Western Europe when they are planning to apply in the arts. So arts would be a very, very good field for people to open up and actually-

Tony:                In which countries do you think?

Jonathan:          Any countries, I mean really, any country in East Asia. And we do of course have some arts applicants each year, but any of the countries could use more arts.

Tony:                We just had a student that went to Japan right? One of the art students? I remember seeing a photo about him.

Jonathan:          Probably.

Schuyler:          I think it was maybe somebody else who actually went to China if I recall.

Jonathan:          I mean, there’s usually one out of the cohort usually, but it’s just not a very large number. And if you look at the, if you break down the application numbers for just the arts applicants, it’s heavily skewed for Western Europe.

Schuyler:          OK, so similar to that question, where would you like to see more applications in the region? I’m sure that there’s a preponderance of applications to certain countries, but certain countries maybe need a little more publicity in terms of what they have to offer and are equally good compared to any other country in the region.

Tony:                That’s a good question.

Jonathan:          In general, it’s the Fulbright Full grants that… we’ve been doing really well with the English Teaching Assistantships programs pretty much across the board in terms of getting applications. For the full grants it seems to be the places starting with ‘M’: Mongolia, Macau, Malaysia tend not to get many… Macau in some years we get no applications for the Fulbright Full Grant. And it is a small former colony that a lot of Americans don’t know of and if they’ve heard of it they just associate it with gambling, but it is a really fascinating place to do research because of its very unique history.

Schuyler:          Well, you could study that there for example.

Jonathan:          Of course. They have several universities there and it’s definitely a place that would be really good… you could design very good projects for it.

                        Mongolia’s… you know, we tend to not get very many applications to Mongolia in any year. But again it’s a fascinating country and I would just say from reading reports and hearing accounts from out Fulbrighters who go to Mongolia, they always have some of the most interesting experiences because it is still very different from and obviously not as developed as other parts of the region.

                        And Malaysia, I’m never quite sure why we don’t get more applications to Malaysia. But I think it’s most South East Asianists in the US tend to focus on Indonesia or Vietnam, maybe Thailand, but Malaysia doesn’t seem to get a lot of attention.

Schuyler:          It’d be a great place to do architecture, for example. There’s a lot of development there.

Jonathan:          Sure and they actually have a special award there where someone can work with the diplomatic academy. There are a couple of special grant opportunities in Malaysia.

Schuyler:          And where could an applicant go and find out more about what’s on offer in Malaysia?

Jonathan:          It’s all on the website.

Schuyler:          It’s all on the website.

Jonathan:          In the country summary.

Schuyler:          In the country summary. And, can I call you, if I need to?

Jonathan:          With specific questions, sure. I mean, we want people to call us when they have very specific questions about the country they are applying to, not with questions like how do I start the application because that information is all on the website. But country specific stuff, sure.

Schuyler:          So, do your research and your homework first and then call Jonathan.

Jonathan:          Exactly.

Tony:                And you can find all his contact info on the website, under Contact Us.

                        Thank you Jonathan.