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From the JAYwalk
Boren Awards Support Study in Croatia and Tanzania
Jenna Chambers ’18 and Carly LoVullo ’16 were selected in April to receive Boren Awards from the National Security Education Program. The highly competitive awards enable recipients to study less commonly taught languages in world regions considered critical to U.S. interests. Only 221 awards to undergraduates were made this cycle.
Chambers, of Saugatuck, Michigan, was an international studies and German double-major and a studio arts minor who became acquainted with Croatia during her semester abroad in Freiburg, Germany. She earned a $20,000 Boren Scholarship to support a yearlong study of Croatian at the University of Zagreb’s Croaticum – Centre for Croatian as Foreign and Second Language. “This is a really strong opportunity for cross-cultural environmental understanding and learning,” says Chambers.
LoVullo, of Cleveland, was a double-major in international studies and black world studies. She earned a $24,000 Boren Fellowship to support a yearlong study of Swahili in Tanzania, at the Kiswahili na Utamaduni in Dar es Salaam. While there, she will research best practices for community-based disease surveillance of dengue fever in three Tanzanian coastal regions. “If we want to ensure that our nation is safe and secure from potential threats by using real-time surveillance, we must collaborate with all actors involved,” LoVullo says.
After their Boren Award-supported projects, the women must fulfill a one-year federal service requirement. Chambers hopes to take a position with the Department of State that intertwines translation and policy work. LoVullo plans to work with the U.S. Agency for International Development with a long-term career goal of becoming a foreign service officer there.