Three AU faculty awarded Fulbright Scholar grants

Three Auburn University faculty have been awarded Fulbright Scholar grants to lecture and perform research at institutions abroad during the 2005-2006 academic year, according to the U.S. Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

Christopher Shook, an AU assistant professor of strategic management, Narendra Singh, a professor of molecular biology, and David South, a professor of forest regeneration, are among approximately 800 U.S. faculty and professionals who will travel abroad to some 140 countries for the 2005-2006 academic year through the Fulbright Scholar Program.

Shook will teach strategic management and conduct research on the development of entrepreneurial intent in transitional economies at the Academy of Economic Sciences in Bucharest, Romania.

Singh said he plans to spend six months in Poland, primarily at Iodz University near Warsaw. He will help his Polish colleagues establish graduate and undergraduate plant biotechnology programs and conduct research on a protein that has therapeutic value for cardiac diseases.

South will lecture on forest nursery and tree-planting practices and review segments of the forestry graduate program at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. While there, he will also be the keynote speaker at a pine-regeneration workshop sponsored by the Institute for Commercial Forestry Research.

“We are excited that these faculty have been honored with Fulbright Scholarships,” said AU Provost John Heilman. “The exchange of ideas that the Fulbright program affords has historically proven beneficial to both the home institution of the scholar and the institution that hosts the scholar. We encourage our faculty to pursue these and other similar opportunities that benefit them individually and Auburn University as a whole.”

Established in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, the Fulbright Scholar Program’s purpose is to build mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries.

America’s flagship international educational exchange activity, it is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Over its 57 years of existence, thousands of U.S. faculty and professionals have studied, taught or done research abroad, and thousands of their counterparts from other countries have engaged in similar activities in the U.S. They are among more than 250,000 American and foreign university students, K-12 teachers, and university faculty and professionals who have participated in one of the several Fulbright exchange programs.

Recipients of Fulbright Scholar awards are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement and because they have demonstrated extraordinary leadership potential in their fields. Among thousands of prominent Fulbright Scholar alumni are Milton Friedman, Nobel Prize-winning economist; Alan Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS); Rita Dove, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet; and Craig Barrett, CEO of Intel Corporation.

For further information about the Fulbright Scholar Program, contact Teresa Liao, communications specialist, Council for International Exchange of Scholars, 202/686-7869, tliao@cies.iie.org or visit www.cies.org.