Fulbright is thrilled to announce that three Fulbright Teacher Exchange alumni have been awarded grants from the Citizen Diplomacy Action Fund (CDAF)!
CDAF was launched in 2019 to address key foreign policy goals by empowering U.S. citizen alumni of U.S. government sponsored exchange programs (ExchangeAlumni) to support their communities through policy-inspired projects. To date, 236 teams of U.S. citizen ExchangeAlumni have been granted over $1.85 million to build on skills gained during their exchange programs, advance U.S. foreign policy priorities, and address the needs of their communities. The 2023 competition was the most competitive to date, with 47 winning teams selected out of 187 applications. You can read more about the 47 teams of grant winners and their projects in this press release from the United States Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Congratulations to this year’s recipients!
Read about the winning projects from Fulbright Teachers below:
Cultural Exchange Through Teen-Centered (High School) Theatre connects teens from a small village in the Plateau Central Region of Burkina Faso with teens from Bowling Green, Ohio, a small city in the Midwest, through theater. The collaborative creative process begins as the class in Burkina Faso creates a performance that highlights socio-economic problems faced by youths in Burkina, as the class in Ohio adapts folktales from Burkina Faso. The adapted plays will be performed over a 10-day period in November 2023 with guided discussions after each performance exploring how the stories demonstrate qualities of human interaction that influence choices and outcomes relating to politics, equity, and gender, and measure conditions that challenge both Burkina and U.S. societies.
Alumni Team: Joanne Gonzalez (Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms Program 2018, United States to India) and Dhia Sanogo (Fulbright Teaching Excellence and Achievement Program 2017, Burkina Faso to United States)
Youth Artpreneurship Training aims to equip youth ages 18-21 in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe with skills to create positive change in their communities, particularly around environmental protection. By providing training in social entrepreneurship and digital literacy, this project seeks to tackle the lack of opportunities for youths to develop social entrepreneurial skills, while also inspiring and empowering youths to become leaders in their communities and create a sustainable future for all. The project also provides community-building opportunities for participants to share insights with their peers in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Alumni Team: Le’Kedra Robertson (Mandela Washington Fellowship Reciprocal Exchange to Zimbabwe) and Jobert Ngwenya (Fulbright Teaching Excellence and Achievement Program 2021, Zimbabwe to United States)
CDAF is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and implemented by Global Ties U.S. in partnership with the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Learn more about CDAF.