Recent Graduates Receive Fulbright Award for 2018
Anna Leah, 2018 Fulbright Recipient
Anna Leah Eisner ’17 (Russian)
Anna Leah Eisner ‘17, Russian Minor was awarded a prestigious Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) in Kyrgyzstan. The Fulbright Program is the U.S. government’s flagship international educational exchange program, offering students grants to conduct research, study and teach abroad. The Fulbright competition at Boston University is open to all current students and alumni.
As a student, not only Anna Leah was an impressively astute reader with a talent for close reading of both poetry and prose, but she was also highly enthusiastic of the Russian language, with a deep passion for any and all aspects of Russian culture. She played a very active role in the Russian program, and was a leader among her peers, offering informal tutoring to other students. During her time at BU, Anna Leah published a poem in Boston University’s literary magazine Coup d’Etat; was a Social Media Intern and Correspondent for Ballets Russes Arts Initiative; served as a Radio DJ, contributor and Editor-in-Chief for WTBU ‘zine The Beat; helped with archival collections at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center; and collaborated with a local Russian film director. She translated the audio of the short documentary video on World War II survivor’s memoirs into English subtitles so the film would be legible to the largest portion of the international audience. In 2017, she became a recipient of the National ACTR Post-Secondary Russian Scholar Laureate Award. Since September 2017, Anna Leah has been teaching in Thailand as a TEFL specialist affiliated with the CIEE Teach in Thailand program. Anna Leah’s current plans are to move to Kyrgyzstan in mid-February to further improve her already-impressive command of Russian, before beginning graduate studies. Ultimately, Anna Leah wants to teach Russian. In her email Anna Leah says, “I am excited to travel to a place that is not so well known in the academic world – or in my own life.”
We offer heartfelt congratulations to Anna Leah!
Talin Yaghoobian, 2018 Fulbright Recipient
Talin Yaghoobian ’14 (Chinese)
Talin graduated in 2014 with a B.A. in Psychology, but made it a point to get a taste of several languages (and she enjoyed all of them!). As an undergrad student, Talin studied Turkish, Japanese, Korean and Chinese for varying amounts of time. Talin says, “the great thing about trying all of these languages was that I developed a sense of how I best learn languages – I think it can be different for everyone and it takes some time to develop the methods that work for you.”
Talin was a part of the Army ROTC program for three and a half years, and they incentivized her and other students to study what the Department of Defense calls “critical” languages. She also received a scholarship with Project GO BU to study Korean in the States, and in the summer of 2011 they also sponsored her for the Shanghai Study Abroad program – “that’s where I fell in love with studying Mandarin! I had taken an interest in Chinese culture in high school after reading several National Geographic articles about China (the one that stood out to me the most was their article about the Uygurs) but it was that study abroad experience that really solidified Mandarin as the language that I want to focus on”, Talin explains.
In addition to all of her success at BU, she also won a College Prize in 2012, awarded by the Donghwa Cultural Foundation, for an essay she wrote on her intercultural experience in Shanghai.
Currently, Talin works full time at the Boston University Pardee School of Global Studies as Dean Najam’s assistant. She continues to Mandarin during her lunch hour and is busy taking courses toward her MBA through BU’s Professional Evening MBA program at night, with a concentration in Finance.
Talin says, “One day I hope to work at a company that has footholds in China and the US, and I hope that through my experience in the Fulbright program I will be able to serve as a cultural liaison for Chinese and American businesses while working in the finance sector. Now more than ever, I think we need cultural understanding on both sides.”
Congratulations, Talin!