By Albrianna Jenkins

In an official statement released earlier this month, the U.S. Department of State’s Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship program announced that “more than 3,000 U.S. undergraduate students have been selected to receive Gilman scholarship awards from the March 2022 application deadline.”

Of these 3,000+ nationwide, 26 students from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville were awarded. This is the highest amount of Gilman recipients UT has had in a single award cycle and collectively amounts to over $100,000 in scholarships received.

Heather Grigsby, Programs Abroad Office (PAO) program coordinator and Gilman advisor, attributes the increase in scholarship recipients to the Programs Abroad Office’s strengthened partnership with the Office of Undergraduate Research and Fellowships (OURF).

“Many of these recipients took part in (the OURF’s) essay writing workshops geared to this scholarship prior to the deadline,” says Grigsby. “What a great result for our UT students!”

The students themselves are also to credit for their willingness to put in the work. Laura De Furio, acting director at OURF, commented, “As we support applicants for competitive awards like the Gilman, we ask students to engage in self-reflection to develop clarity of purpose around their education and achievements at UT and capture their stories in writing. We are so proud that so many of our workshop participants were named Gilman Scholars!”

The next Gilman cycle opens mid-August with an application deadline of Thursday, October 6, 2022. OURF and PAO will to continue to provide student support for the Gilman and other nationally competitive scholarships to increase program accessibility and allow students to fund their dreams to go abroad.

More about the scholarship: “The U.S. Department of State’s Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship Program enables students of limited financial means to study or intern abroad, providing them with skills critical to our national security and economic prosperity. To be eligible for the Gilman Program, applicants must be receiving a Federal Pell Grant during the time of application or provide proof that they will be receiving a Pell Grant during the term of their study abroad program or internship. The Institute of International Education has administered the program since its inception in 2001.” This information was obtained from https://www.gilmanscholarship.org.

For questions about the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, please contact the Programs Abroad Office at the Center for Global Engagement at 865-974-3177 or volsabroad@utk.edu.

CONTACT:

Albrianna Jenkins (865-974-3177, ajenki58@utk.edu)