“to bring a little more knowledge, a little more reason, and a little
more compassion into world affairs and thereby increase the
chance that nations will learn at last to live in peace and
friendship”
Senator J. William Fulbright
General Introduction
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Established
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After World War II
Legislation by J. William Fulbright
Awards
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75000, new grants annually
thousands of alumni
Many come to US to study
Many go outside US to study
What they offer(
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Foreign Student Program
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MS/Doctoral studies
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Who Can Apply
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NON- US citizen
graduate students, young professionals and artists
Every Region has different number of scholarships
Where to Look
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http://www.iie.org/en/Fulbright
http://foreign.fulbrightonline.org/
NOTE: For other types of grants like travel grant look at
http://www.iie.org/en/Fulbright
What they offer
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Other programs offered
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For Undergrads and Professionals
Check Region’s website
See the link
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http://www.iie.org/en/Fulbright
http://www.usefpakistan.org/
Where to look
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Fulbright website
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http://fulbright.state.gov/
IIE website
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http://www.iie.org/en/Fulbright
My Note
This Presentation is about MY
EXPERIENCE or how I FEEL what
matters in the Fulbright Application. It is
NOT official rule or description of what
they look for
My Experience---- Why Fulbright?
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Places
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About 140 countries, countless cities and amazing towns
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From 1992 till 2007 I lived in ONE city Lahore,
Now I am studying thousands of miles away from home
Culture
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Experience the world different than yours
Understand why some people do what they do.
Before this
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I have never ate burrito
Never celebrated Thanks Giving
My Experience---Why Fulbright
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People
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People from other countries
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Different culture, different behavior,.
Just broadens your mind
Today I have
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Friends from America, India (see Pakistan and India don’t see eye to eye),
Mexico, Greece. Remained roommate with exchange student from
Nigeria.
People from your own Country
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will meet people filtered by selection process
Different fields, different areas, different interests, different views
Amazing diversity in your own country
My Experience– Why Fulbright?
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For Best
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It’s Adventure.
What you need?
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Some of the Most Important things
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GRE
Personal Statement
Statement of Grant Purpose / Research Statement
3 letters of References
Transcripts
My Experience
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Long process(http://us.fulbrightonline.org/overview_timeline.html?page=us/overview_timeline)
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Application Starts in May (submission deadline is later in the
year)
Decisions sometime come till next year’s June
For Foreign Students
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Waiting for Visa ; extra headache
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Mine took about 4 months
So
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Don’t Stop your life waiting for Results
Intern/Teach/Research or at least travel 
Why?
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Because you will not feel wasting a year if you don’t get in.
My Experience
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Application
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It’s Long Application
Start Early
Do multiple goes
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I took print out and filled it with pencil
Let someone else read it
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Sometime we become blind to our mistakes
My Experience
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Essays
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Most Tough Part
Takes most of your time
Write it, read it, write it again
Let others read it
Take Care of Grammatical mistakes
Don’t write too much and don’t write too little
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Personal Statement
Statement of Grant Purpose / Research Statement
My Experience
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Personal Statement
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Not your life story
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Just highlights
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First few lines are important
I followed advice given in (Mor Harchol-Balter, CMU)
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Why certain bad grade or GRE score. Or Why suddenly your grades
become better
Catch them
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Don’t duplicate your scores and GPA
Opportunity to explain discrepancies
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About where you are
Why this is important for application
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~harchol/gradschooltalk.pdf
Go over few Personal Statements
My Experience
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Statement of Grant Purpose / Research Statement
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Have a look at previous PDF
First few sentences to catch attention
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I started my statement by telling my first experience of Face
Detection and how it amazed me.
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Why your research? Why this area?
Why this Grant be given to you?
What you have done in this area previously
But then I told them What I am Doing NOW.
Reading examples of Research Statement help.
Webminar “Crafting Your Fulbright Project Statement”
http://www.cies.org/Webinar/
My Experience
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Reference Letters
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Carefully choose whom to ask for letter
They should know your work and you
Simply indicating good GPA is not enough
I found it better to get letters from professors
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Who have studied in US
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Tell them
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So it may help to get letter from teachers who have experience studying
or teaching outside US
for what kind of program you are asking Reference Letter
Discuss with them
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Do they think you are good for program?
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help you know whether that person will give good reference letter or not
YES they can write “This Student does not deserve to be in this program”
My Experience
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Reference Letters
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Discuss with them
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Transcripts
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Teachers can ask you to waive your right of reading the reference
letter
Apply for them early
Arrange them properly
Make note of all the material you are sending
Keep Backup copy of everything
My Experience
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Interview
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After initial screening
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Be confident
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Opportunity to tell and explain anything you missed
Why you should be selected?
Prepare for it
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Few selected students
Ask your friends to ask you questions
Mirror talk
Usual Suspects
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Take few moments to answer
Sit upright, dress comfortably
Look towards everyone
Ask Question --- Yes you should ask question also to the interviewers
My Experience--- What Counts
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Good Grades, Good GRE, Good Reference Letters
Good Interview
They are looking for
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Not only Intelligent Person but
Hard working also
Most Importantly
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Person who can Go and Make friends in other country
Person who is open to “Different”
Person with Extracurricular and social activities.
My Experience
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Some people drop even after getting accepted
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So rethink
Links
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http://www.iie.org/en/Fulbright
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How Do I Apply for Fulbright?
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Webminars
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http://fulbright.state.gov/fulbright/become/howdoiapply
http://www.cies.org/Webinar/
Application TIPS and timeline
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http://us.fulbrightonline.org/overview_timeline.html?page=us/o
verview_timeline
See Your Region’s website