This page lists several scholarships offered by the CHFA. A couple of them are specifically for foreign language majors.
Author Archives: Luis Marentes
Scholarship opportunities for double-majors with SBS
I just got an email announcing a couple of scholarship opportunities. They do not apply to Spanish or Portuguese majors specifically, but do apply to those of you who have a secondary major with SBS: Continue reading
Internships with New York County District Attorney’s Office
This past summer one of our graduates did a translation/interpreting internship with New York County’s District Attorney’s Office. She tells me it was a great experience and she urges other students to consider applying. You can see information about the internship here. She has also sent me the following contact information:
Virginia Blanco – Spanish Language Internships Coordinator
Email: blancov@dany.nyc.gov
Tel: 212 – 335 – 4018
New service-learning class: “Preserving Food Culture from the Homeland”
Reflecting on the reflection: a personal reaction to student experience and writing
[My friend Nicholas Belardes encouraged me to reflect and write about my teaching experiences at UMass. My first post on this subject was inspired by the reflections of this year’s Integrative Experience students. I repost here what I wrote for the Nicholas Belardes site. As students’ understanding of themselves changes through experience, so does faculty’s; and as we ask students to reflect, so should we. Here is my own personal reflection.]
THE ASSIGNMENT WAS SIMPLE – a reflection about our seniors’ changing relationship with the Spanish major -, but it made for one of my best weeks as a teacher. Not necessarily because of my own classroom performance, but because of what the students’ writing revealed about their development. I spent a couple of days checking my computer every ten minutes, expecting to receive their texts. Continue reading
Auxiliares de conversación de EE.UU. y Canadá
This program organized by Spain’s Ministerio de educación, cultura y deporte has given a great opportunity to many of our graduates. You get to live in Spain for at least a year while developing your teaching skills. The application is somewhat complicated, but it is worth your time.
Thatcher Language House
The Thatcher Language House offers a great opportunity to live in a setting that allows you to speak Spanish and share your interests about the Spanish-speaking world. The deadline to apply for this great program is March 10.
Maureen Flanagan Scholarship
The Maureen Flanagan Scholarship seems to be specifically designed for students in our Integrative Experience. I urge you to consider applying.
The purpose of this scholarship is to provide support for undergraduate students, with a preference for women, who have financial need as demonstrated in the content of their Financial Aid Application. The scholarship will offer students opportunities above and beyond the standard college experience such as, but not limited to, research, summer internships, alternative spring breaks, community service, or other initiatives that complement and enhance the chosen course of study of the students selected.
Office of Overseas Schools
The State Department’s Office of Overseas Schools is a great resource for those of you interested in exploring teaching opportunities abroad. I highly recommend you explore their page.
State Department to promote more student exchanges with Latin America
Today I found this story about the State Department intending to promote more student exchanges between Latin America and the United States. As the story points out, the government has determined that it is important for us to promote much more student exchanges between the two regions as we are geographically, politically and economically linked. The article also points out that at this time these exchanges are quite limited in relation to our actual relations. As a long-time professor at UMass, this doesn’t come as a surprise to me, and I must confess that I am disappointed by the limited scope of this relationship. My experience is that many more of my students, for one reason or another, tend to prefer Spain over Latin America as a study destination. The irony, however, is that often the interest in Spanish is because of the geographical proximity to our southern neighbors (and the increased Latin American population in the US), but the choice of a place to study the language is dictated by other reasons. A few years back I read this interesting article about the history of Spanish studies in the United States which in a way addresses some of the reasons behind this contradiction.
Beyond this, I’d also like to point out that I find another interesting aspect to this story: the fact that much of the $1,000,000 (a small amount if you really consider it) is going to be dedicated to make Latin American universities better cater to US students. On the surface, a good proposition, but I wonder to what degree specifically catering to US students and creating special programs for them defeats part of the purpose of going abroad – to learn the way in which other societies function.
Any thoughts?