Hungarian-American Enterprise
Scholarship Fund
Award Recipients
Spring 2007
Council on International Educational Exchange
History
Hungarian-American Enterprise
Scholarship Fund
The Hungarian-American
Enterprise Scholarship
Fund’s (HAESF) objective is
to promote free enterprise
and development in
Hungary and to continue
strengthening ties between
the United States and
Hungary by creating
opportunities for
accomplished Hungarians
and those of great promise
to gain professional
experience in the United
States.
In 1989, amidst the continuous disintegration of Communism, the United States
Congress enacted the Support of Eastern
European Democracy Act (SEED), which
authorized the creation of enterprise funds
to assist the development of private market
economy in Central and Eastern Europe.
Between 1989 and 1994, the U.S. Congress,
through The U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID), appropriated a total
of $1.3 billion to establish ten new investment funds known collectively as the
Enterprise Funds, throughout Central and
Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet
Union. From the beginning, USAID structured the Enterprise Funds to be guided by
independent Boards of Directors selected
from the upper tiers of the U.S. private sector, who in turn selected the Fund’s day-today operating management.
HAEF, established through a grant of $72.5
million as one of the original Enterprise
Funds, was a unique, Western-style venture
capital fund, tasked with achieving both critical economic development goals, as well as
serving as a model for conducting effective,
efficient and transparent investment practices. It was charged with promoting private
sector in Hungary by financing small and
medium-sized private enterprises through
loans, grants, equity investments, feasibility
studies, technical assistance, training, insurance, guarantees, and other measures.
HAEF made investments in existing and new
Hungarian companies and took an active
role in assisting them with strategic and
financial planning, training, and identifying
strategic partners. In most cases, HAEF
invested in companies where operating
management participated in the profits
and/or ownership of the business.
By the successful and efficient use of its
resources during the 15 years of active
investment operations HAEF was able to
make a significant long-term impact, in line
with its original goals of promoting free
enterprise in Hungary. The Fund was also
able to realize financial success from many of
their investments, so that there was a substantial remaining pool of capital available at
the end of its active investment period. With
this pool of available capital in mind the
Fund created a new vision to further the
HAEF mission. HAEF began the process of
liquidating its portfolio investments with the
intention of returning half of the funds to the
U.S. Treasury and creating a scholarship fund
— this time as an independent not-for-profit
organization — with the other half. It established HAESF as a major legacy fellowship
program to further improve the economic
development in Hungary by providing
accomplished Hungarians with professional
training opportunities in the U.S.
HAESF announced its first programs three
years ago in 2004. Since then HAESF has
provided financial and professional support
to over 100 Hungarians in gaining professional experience in the United States.
This year, we are pleased to introduce the
sixth group of HAESF Fellows comprised of
eleven Undergraduate Internship Fellows
and one Senior Leader and Scholar. They
were selected from a vast pool of talented
applicants in recognition of their outstanding qualifications and potential to build professional framework for long lasting impact
in Hungary.
Beginning in spring 2007, these recent
HAESF scholarship recipients will be pursuing their individual projects and internships
at a number of prominent American businesses and organizations in different regions
of the United States. We are certain that
these exchange programs will facilitate an
effective exchange of professional competencies and fresh perspectives and promote
cross-cultural dialog. We are confident that
the experience will be beneficial to the
Fellows in their future careers, the companies and organizations hosting the Fellows
as well as to Hungarian society at large.
Senior Leaders
and Scholars Fellowship
Zoltan Szoke
George Washington University
National Archives and Records Administration
Full funding for independently
organized projects that fulfill
professional and leadership goals
and benefit Hungarian society.
HAESF Senior Leaders and Scholars Fellowship program provides
funding for 3-12 month Fellowships to the most accomplished professionals and leaders from Hungary.
The program provides significant funding to distinguished mid-level
and senior-level Hungarian professionals in business, public administration, non-profit organizations and academia enabling them to
pursue individual and independently organized projects in the
United States. The program promotes knowledge and experiential
sharing between Hungarian and American leaders, further strengthening ties between the nations and providing invaluable career and
personal development opportunities for participants to leverage in
their leadership roles upon their return to Hungary.
Zoltan is a senior archivist at the National Archives of Hungary.
During the past ten years as an expert in long term electronic
preservation he played a leading role in the efforts aimed at laying
the foundations of electronic archives in Hungary. He has also represented his country at political and professional forums within the
international archival community, most importantly in the European
Union’s and NATO’s archive committees.
Like most Hungarian archivists, Zoltan also holds a degree in History
and conducting historical research is an integral part of his daily
work. As a historian, his main field of interest is the international history of the Cold War with special regard to the Hungarian involvement in the Vietnam War. In 1998/1999 his interest took him to
Oxford University, where, as a visiting graduate student of Lincoln
College, he carried out a research project looking into the British
role of the Indochina conflict.
As a HAESF Senior Leader and Scholar Fellow, Zoltan is spending
twelve months in Washington, D.C. conducting archival research at
the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies of the
Elliott School of International Affairs (George Washington
University) and at the National Archives and Records
Administration. His main research objective is to collect all U.S. foreign policy records relevant to his future study concerning
Hungary’s role in Vietnam between 1950 and 1975.
Zoltan lives in Budapest with his wife Gyongyi and their two children Sara, age 4 and Denes Ivan, age 2. His hobbies include tennis,
cooking, traveling, reading science-fiction and playing the guitar.
Balazs Schafer
Undergraduate
Internship Fellows
Mirage Center
Balazs is a fifth year Faculty of Dentistry student at Semmelweis University in Budapest.
His professional field of interest is oral and
maxillofacial surgery. As a student, he
researched dental implants at the Department
of Oro-Maxillofacial Surgery and Stomatology
which placed him third at the Students’
Research Conference in 2004. He was also
awarded the ERASMUS scholarship to attend
a semester in Freiburg, Germany in addition
to being an OMAA scholarship recipient
where he trained for four months at the
Medical University of Vienna.
Balazs will spend eight months at the Mirage
Center, a state-of-the-art Oral and
Maxillofacial Surgery Clinic in Palm Springs,
California. There, he will have an outstanding
opportunity to shadow surgeons and acquire
extensive theoretical knowledge on dental
implants, bone grafting, mandibular-joint disorder treatments and orthognathic interventions. After returning to Hungary, Balazs will
complete his degree and begin his residency
program in oral surgery.
In his spare time, Balazs often travels and
enjoys swimming, skiing, waterskiing, playing
tennis and golf.
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
Fully-funded training opportunities designed to
enhance professional and leadership skills and
increase potential for future contribution to
economic and societal development in Hungary.
The HAESF Undergraduate Internship program grants fully funded
6-12 month internships at prominent American companies designed
to enhance professional and leadership skills.
The goal of the program is to provide promising future leaders of
Hungarian society an opportunity to have a meaningful international training experience, thereby enhancing their contribution to their
home country and its development upon their return. Selected
Fellows will be placed in career-related internships that further their
professional and personal development, provide them with leadership and cross-cultural communication skills, improve their English
language acquisition and help them advance as they attend graduate school and enter the work force at home.
Benedek Gal
Natural Resources Research Institute
Benedek is a fifth year geology student at the
Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest. His academic field of interest is the geology of ore
deposits and raw mineral exploration. He is an
active member of the Eotvos Lorand Student
Chapter of the Society of Economic
Geologists (SEG).
Benedek will be training at the University of
Minnesota’s Natural Resources Research
Institute in Duluth, MN where he will work on
mineral exploration projects. While there, he
will carry out hands-on field work where and
gain experience integrating geological data
into digital models utilitizing the latest
methodology and software. When Benedek
returns to Hungary, he will finish his Master’s
thesis and pursue a job in mineral exploration.
In his free time, Benedek plays in a band. He
also likes to hike, swim and bike ride.
Eszter Takacsi-Nagy
Julia Vida
Federal Trade Commission
Eszter is a final year student at the Pazmany
Peter Catholic University, Faculty of Law and
Political Sciences. She also graduated with
distinction from the University of Abertay
Dundee with a BA Hons General Studies and
Law. Eszter also spent a year abroad in
Germany as an ERASMUS scholar.
Council of Great City Schools
RMC Research Corporation
returns to Hungary she would like to utilize her
practical experience gained in the United
States at the Hungarian Competition
Authority or at a law firm specializing in competition law.
Eszter likes to learn foreign languages, travel
and explore new cultures.
Eszter’s academic field of interest is European
competition law. She will spend a year in
Washington, D.C. at the Federal Trade
Commission to learn more about the US
approach to competition law. When Eszter
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
Franciska Bakos
HMAA & SUNY Buffalo
Franciska is a sixth year medical student at
Semmelweis University in Budapest. Her academic focus and interest is internal medicine
and neurology. While at the university she
conducted research on cardiovascular complications of diabetes mellitus. Besides her medical studies, she is an active member of the
Hungarian Scientific Students Association.
Under the framework of a professional
exchange program organized by the
Hungarian Medical Association of America
(HMAA), Franciska will be completing a three
month medical rotation at the State University
of New York in Buffalo. Her rotations will
include in-patient neurology training at different hospitals (including Buffalo General
Hospital, Roswell Park Cancer Institute and
Dent Neurological Institute), out-patient
endocrinology training at the Millard Filmore
Gates Hospital and round out her rotation at
the Department of Family Medicine.
After graduating from Semmelweis University
Franciska plans to begin her residency in internal medicine in Budapest.
When not studying, Franciska likes to play
sports, travel, visit exhibitions, go to theatre
performances and socialize at cafes with friends.
Julia Vida is a recent graduate of the Eotvos
Lorand University where she holds a dual
Master of Arts degree in Teacher of English
Language and Literature as well as Teacher of
Spanish Language and Literature. She also
completed a year long program of Cultural
Management and Hungarian as a Foreign
Language at the same institution. In 2003 she
spent a semester at the University of Malaga,
Spain as a participant in the ERASMUS student exchange program.
Julia is spending eight months at the Council
of Great City Schools in Washington DC and
four months at RMC Research in Portsmouth,
New Hampshire to learn about educational
policies and education research in the United
States. Upon returning home she would like to
dedicate herself to promoting educational
reforms and modernization in Hungary.
In her spare time Julia loves to read, cook and
dance. She is also very eager to travel and get
to know people from different cultures.
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
Katalin Balazs
HMAA & SUNY Buffalo
Katalin is a final year medical student at the
University of Debrecen, Medical and Health
Science Center. Her academic interest
includes nuclear medicine and anaesthesiology. She is also an active member of the
Hungarian Scientific Students Association.
While in the United States, Katalin will have
the opportunity to spend three months on a
medical rotation at the State University of
New York in Buffalo under the framework of a
professional exchange program organized by
the Hungarian Medical Association of America
(HMAA). During her rotation, she will be visit-
ing the departments of nuclear medicine,
internal medicine and anaesthesiology. When
she returns to Hungary, she will complete her
degree and begin her residency program.
When she is not busy studying Katalin likes
travelling, playing music and spending time
with her friends.
Peter Bolla
Rita Csernai
GeoSpatial Servicees Institute
of Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota
Peter is a recent graduate of the Eotvos
Lorand University in Budapest where he studied cartography and geospatial information
systems (GIS). He also holds a Master of
Science degree in Technical Informatics, which
he obtained at the Budapest University of
Technology and Economics in 2003. Since
then he has been working as a software developer at a major internet service provider.
IT background to develop advanced survey
tools. After returning to Hungary, Peter will
make use of his experience to do GIS research
& development.
Peter is always open to new interests let it be
either professional or personal. He is fond of
outdoor sports, especially hiking and running,
and likes challenging books and movies.
Peter will spend a year in Winona, Minnesota
at the GeoSpatial Services Institute of Saint
Mary’s University of Minnesota. There he will
further develop his GIS skills, incorporating his
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
Peter Rona
Avaya Inc.
A fifth year information technology student at
the Budapest University of Technology and
Economics, Peter’s main field of study is
telecommunications specializing in next generation networks. He is also an active member
of Electrical Engineering Students’ Hungarian
Association.
Peter will spend 12 months in Miami at Avaya
Inc., a leading telecommunication company.
He will gain professional experience on the
tools and project management methods
required for new product introduction.
Because his training site is also Avaya’s cus-
Porter Novelli
Rita is completing her final year at Pazmany
Peter Catholic University, Faculty of Arts
where she double majors in English and
American studies and Communications. She
specializes in Public Relations and is interested
in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and
Marketing Communications.
She will be spending one year in Washington,
D.C. at Porter Novelli, a prestigious Public
Relations agency. She will be learning first-rate
social marketing practices at the Health Care
& CSR Division where she will participate in
several client projects emphasizing on
Corporate Social Responsibility. After she
returns to Hungary, Rita will pursue a job in
the field of Corporate Social Responsibility.
In her free time, Rita enjoys visiting exhibitions
of modern art, reading and travelling. She is
also a member of a contemporary dance company.
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
Tamas Turcsanyi
Chemonics International Inc.
tomer service center’s regional headquarters,
he will acquire an understanding of the tasks
and responsibilities of a busy customer service
center. After returning to Hungary, Peter will
complete his final semester at the university
and enter Hungary’s telecommunication field.
Peter is enthusiastic about photography, folk
dance and cooking. He loves traveling and
getting to know the various languages, dishes
of different cultures.
A recent graduate of the Corvinus University
of Budapest, Tamas majored in Foreign Affairs
and European Studies. He is also a graduate
of Eotvos Lorand University, where he majored
in Japanese Studies. He has strong ties with
Japan, as he spent the first four years of elementary school in Tokyo. In 2004, he studied
at Hitotsubashi University (Tokyo) where he
was awarded a Japanese Government
Scholarship.
Tamas is currently spending a year in
Washington, DC learning more about the
complex process of international development at Chemonics International, a global
consulting firm promoting economic growth
and higher living standards in developing
countries. He will serve in the Europe &
Eurasia department’s business development
unit where he will be involved with new business efforts, research, and new business strategy development and implementation. This
will broaden his knowledge of a region important to the European Union and Hungary.
Other than Hungarian and English, Tamas is
fluent in Japanese and also speaks some
French. In his spare time, he likes reading
about history and geography, and also enjoys
cycling and hiking.
Zsombor Vecsey
Mirage Center
ciee
Zsombor is a final year dental student at the
Semmelweis University of Medicine in
Budapest. His primary area of interest is oral
and maxillofacial surgery. He is an active member and first prize holder of Hungary’s
Students Research Association. As an ERASMUS scholar, Zsombor studied a semester in
Freiburg, Germany. He is also a recipient of
the Harsing Scholarship and Hungary’s
Ministry of Education Scholarship.
acquire extensive professional experience in
the field of oral surgery included bone grafting, implantology and orthognathic surgery.
When Zsombor returns to Hungary, he will
complete his final semester and begin his residency program in oral surgery.
Zsombor’s extracurricular activities include skiing, playing tennis and golf.
Zsombor will spend nine months at Mirage
Center Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Clinic in
Palm Springs, California. He is eager to
International Work & Study Programs
Undergraduate Internship Fellows
CIEE or Council on International Educational
Exchange is HAESF’s partner in the US responsible for the administration and management of
the programs including securing internship
placements, distributing financial awards and
providing J-1 Visa sponsorship.
Founded as a non-profit, non-governmental organization in 1947,
CIEE is one of the oldest, largest and most respected names in student study abroad and exchange programs. Each year, CIEE sponsors nearly 50,000 young professionals, university and high school
students, helping them to grow personally and to develop their
potential through participation in a wide variety of exchange programs across the globe. It is dedicated to the mission of helping
people to gain understanding, acquire knowledge, and develop
skills for living in a globally interdependent and culturally diverse
world.
HAESF has a track record of working with an exceptional
group of leading American companies who have
embraced a unique opportunity to bring an international
dimension to their workplace.
HAESF would like to express its gratitude to honored members
of the Board of Advisors for dedicating their valuable time and
professional expertise thereby contributing to the success of the
scholarship program.
Host Organizations
HAESF Board of Advisors
Business & Finance
Boston Consulting Group
Siemens Venture Capital
General Electric
Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
Federal Reserve Bank of New York
KPMG
A.G. Edwards and Sons
AON
Friedman, Billings and Ramsey
Lloyds TSB Bank
Bainbridge
Allegiance Financial Group
Monitor
Braver Group
Foster’s Wine Estates
Porter Novelli
Foreign & Public Policy
Brookings Institution
United Nations
Amnesty International
Atlantic Council of the U.S.
International Rescue Committee
Alliance for International Educational
and Cultural Exchange
Center for Strategic and International
Studies
U.S. Committee for UN Development
Programs
Indiana Department of Revenue
Hudson Institute
Chemonics
Education
Council of the Great City Schools
RMC Research Corporation
Law
Federal Trade Commission
Squire, Sanders & Dempsey
Weil, Gotshal & Manges
White & Case
The CPR Institute for Dispute
Resolution
Fredricks Law
Rozsa Law
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP
Public Health, Medicine &
Biotechnology
Boston Scientific
Genzyme Corporation
NeuroNexus Technologies
Center for Disease Control (CDC)
Pan American Health Organization
(PAHO)
Jackson Memorial Hospital at the
University of Miami Hungarian
Medical Association of America &
Dent Neurological Institute at SUNY
Department of Dermatology, Boston
University
Center for Neural Science, New York
University
Mirage Center
Air Transportation
American Airlines
Natural Resources
Natural Resources Research Institute
ExxonMobil
Placer Dome
Peter Akos Bod Chair
Professor and Head
Economic Policy Department
Corvinus University of Budapest
Former President, Hungarian National Bank
Akos Detrekoi
Professor, Photogrammetric and Geoinformatic Department
Budapest University of Technology and Economics
Full Member, Hungarian Academy of Sciences
H.E. Geza Jeszenszky
Professor, Corvinus University of Budapest
Former Foreign Minister of Hungary
Former Hungarian Ambassador to US
Tamas Magyarics
Associate Professor and Head
Department of American Studies
Eotvos Lorant University
Editor-in-Chief, Foreign Policy Review
Senior Research Fellow
Center for Foreign Policy Studies, Teleki Laszlo Institute
Adam Tertak
Information Technology
Dean, CEU Business School
Former CEO
Hungarian Investment and Trade Agency
Former CEO
Ernst and Young Hungary
Graphisoft R&D, Inc.
Lyra Research
Zsolt Tulassay M.D., D.Sc.
Telecomunications
Avaya Inc
Sciences & Engineering
GeoSpatial Servicees Institute of Saint
Mary’s University of Minnesota
NASA’s AMES Astro-biological
Research Center
The Louis Berger Group
SSFM International
Media, Communications & Arts
Museum of Fine Arts in Boston
Arizona Daily Sun
1171 Production Group
Exit Art
Professor of Medicine and Gastroenterology
Director of 2nd Medical Department
Semmelweis University of Medicine
Istvan Tompe
Managing Director, Merito Consulting
Former Deputy General Director of Strategy
Hungarian State Railways
Istvan Hargittai
Professor, Chemical Engineering Department
Budapest University of Technology and Economics
Full Member, Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Hungarian-American
Enterprise Scholarship Fund
CIEE Exchanges, Inc.
Kereskedelmi Képviselete
(HAESF Ösztöndíj Alap)
Andrássy út 61., I/5.
Budapest
1062 Hungary
Tel: (36-1) 413 0018
Email: info@haesf.org
www.haesf.org
Council on International Educational Exchange
300 Fore Street, Portland, Maine, 04101 USA
Tel: +1.207.553.4130 Fax: +1.207.553.5130
www.ciee.org