Graduates Earn Fulbright Awards to Germany and Austria

Three recent graduates of Saint John’s University in Collegeville have received awards from Fulbright commissions in Germany and Austria.

Lewis Grobe, Bennett Frensko and Keith Spinali will teach in Europe during 2006-07 in two different programs. All three graduated May 14 from SJU.

Both Grobe and Frensko received 10-month Fulbright/Pedagogic Exchange grants to Germany, where they will be Fulbright Teaching Assistants. Spinali will be part of an eight-month program for U.S. teaching assistants, which the Fulbright Commission in Vienna coordinates for the Austrian Ministry of Education.

Grobe, from Orono, Minn., majored in humanities and German at SJU and graduated Summa Cum Laude. He said he feared the worst when he received a “thin envelope” from the Fulbright Commission in April.

“From the size of the envelope, I assumed that I didn’t get it, but decided I had to face the music at some time and opened it to the surprise that I had in fact been accepted … a pretty good feeling to say the least,” Grobe said.

During his stay in Germany, Grobe will be a teaching assistant of English at a small gymnasium (high school) in the state of Sachsen-Anhalt. He will also be doing research that he began at SJU on the integration of Turkish-Germans into German culture and society.

Grobe, who is interested in becoming a college professor, thinks the program “will most definitely help me decide if this is the path I want to take or not. It will also allow me to develop my knowledge of the German language and the German culture, which is nice.”

Frensko, from Sartell, Minn., was a German major and art minor at Saint John’s. Though he was accepted into programs in both Germany and Austria, he will teach in Germany.

“The program itself allows for recently graduated seniors, such as myself, to act as English teaching assistants (ESL) within their country of choice,” Frensko said. “If anything, it will offer opportunities for personal growth and self-discovery.”

Spinali, who graduated Magna Cum Laude from SJU at the age of 19, will undertake a teaching assistantship program of the Austrian Ministry of Education that has been coordinated by the Fulbright Commission since 1963.

Spinali said he was made aware of the program by friends and Emmerich Sack, a German teacher at Saint John’s Preparatory School in Collegeville. Sack, who is also director of the school’s Study Abroad program, said Spinali will teach in gymnasiums at Scheibbs and Wieselburg, Austria – not far from where Spinali studied in Melk with the Saint John’s Prep program.

“It is … an excellent opportunity for me to perfect my German and spend a year traveling about central southern Europe,” added Spinali, a German major from Clearwater, Minn.

The Fulbright Program is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State. It is the largest U.S. international exchange program, offering opportunities for students, scholars and professionals to undertake international graduate study, advanced research, university teaching and teaching in elementary and secondary schools worldwide.

The program, established in 1946, awarded approximately 6,000 grants in 2004, at a cost of more than $250 million. The grants were awarded to U.S. teachers, professionals and scholars to study, teach, lecture and conduct research in more than 150 countries, and to their foreign counterparts to engage in similar activities in the United States.

The Fulbright Program is managed by binational commissions and foundations in 50 countries, 48 of which are funded jointly by the United States and the host government. In other countries, the program is coordinated by the cultural affairs sections of U.S. embassies. Each Fulbright Commission or Foundation has a board composed of an equal number of Americans and citizens of the host country. Commissions propose annual country programs, which establish the numbers and categories of grants, based on collaboration with local institutions.