BGSU Welcome

Fulbright scholars to head overseas in January to teach

Two faculty members have won Fulbright Scholarships and will be teaching abroad during the first semester of 1998.

Suzanne Crawford, dean of Continuing Education, International & Summer Programs, will teach at Khazar University in Baku in the Republic of Azerbaijan. She will teach two courses focusing on educating teachers and administrators in Baku about adult learner programs and the administration of colleges and universities in the United States.

Carol Hess, assistant professor of musical arts, will teach Latin American and North American music to doctoral students at the Universidad Autonoma in Barcelona, Spain, during spring 1998. She also will be conducting a lecture series in Madrid and Barcelona.

Under the Fulbright program, two types of grants are available: teaching and research and both Crawford and Hess won teaching grants. The purpose of the program is to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries.

Selection of Fulbright scholars is very competitive; each year's grantees hail from approximately 500 colleges, universities and public and private agencies in 50 states.

For Crawford, a major drawing card for teaching in Azerbaijan is that the country is "where the East and West cultures collide." Azerbaijan is one of three republics of the former Soviet Union and is located in the mountain region which borders Russia on the north, Iran on the south and the Caspian Sea on the east.

There are four million people in Baku, the capital city, and only 7.2 million in the whole country, Crawford said. Ethnic groups include Armenians, Russians, Azerbaijans, Turks ... 85 percent of the people in the country are Muslims."

Azerbaijan "is emerging into the 21st century," Crawford said. "What that means is that we have a backlog of 200 years to get through in a short time." The former Soviet Republic is becoming computerized, Crawford said, "and they're developing the skills and abilities to use the computers and they are getting into distance learning now, too."

"They want to know about U.S. universities and how they can apply what we do in their own country," Crawford said. "They also want to know the elements of higher education and funding sources. Secondly, what I'll be teaching them is how to develop programs for the adult learners." As their country becomes more modern and technological, their work force is being re-trained with new skills, she said.

Khazar University already has a BG link in that Khazar's Founder and Chancellor Dr. Hamlet Issakhanly previously visited the BGSU campus. Khazer is a private university established in 1991.

With the Republic of Azerbaijan located in one of the world's trouble spots, Crawford has undergone a State Department background check and medical examination. She attended an orientation in July 1997. "one of the things the State Department was forceful about was our awareness that we would be a female in a part of the world where females still wear veils over their faces," she said.

Crawford will be leaving in February and live in Baku until June. Although she will be teaching in English, a translator will be assigned to her to ease communication.

Having two Fulbright Scholars, Crawford said, "is a tribute to Bowling Green State University that we continue to seek out and accommodate people who want to try for Fulbrights."

"It also sends a message to other faculty and staff that they should continue applying for Fulbrights," she said. "The experience they will bring back will infuse learning on the campus."

Crawford said she applied for a Fulbright because "the current shrinking of the globe has made it imperative for academics today to experience cultures other than their own.

"It's a professional opportunity that will spill over onto the students and campus here."

Crawford joined the University faculty in 1970 and started working in its then-fledgling continuing education program in 1974.

Before moving to Bowling Green, she was a faculty member at the University of Kansas and the University of Rhode Island, and was a graduate counselor at the University of Toronto.

Fulbright applicants must justify how they intend to use the award and Hess said, "I felt teaching North American and Latin American music would provide a perspective for Spanish music students that they did not have."

Hess will teach about selected composers from Colonial times to the present.

Until recently, she said, Spanish students had to study abroad to achieve their music doctorate, but "there now are some places in Spain where doctoral students can go and Barcelona is one of them."

Hess speaks both Spanish and Catalan, which is spoken in Barcelona, and will be presenting her classes and lecture series in Spanish.

She specializes in Spanish music. "I used to be a pianist and discovered Spanish piano music, which I played in concerts while I lived in California," she said.

"The goal for me will be achieving a different perspective than you get from just visiting Spain as an independent researcher, which I also have done.

"If you actually work in the university you have an awareness of how the European university system works. I think you're not fully aware of it until you actually live it."

For the students, Hess said she hopes they will gain a different perspective on American music.

"I would like for the students to know about American music. I want them to gain familiarity with it and hope it increases their understanding," she said.

Her visit to Spain in 1998 will be especially timely, she said, because next year is the 100th anniversary of the Spanish-American War "and there will be many conferences there about that."

The Spanish-American War was significant because it thrust the United States onto the international scene as a major power.

For Spain, "it was a disaster because that marked the beginning of losing their empire," Hess said.

The anniversary will be the subject of much discussion, she said. "Although those are non-musical issues, they are of interest to me," she said.

While in Spain, she will present a series of 10 lectures sponsored by a private foundation on neo-classicism, a trend in 20th century music.

In addition, she has recently accepted an invitation to present a lecture in Madrid on the American composer George Gershwin.

Hess has traveled in Barcelona and Madrid on numerous occasions since 1987 on research projects. The most recent project involved a research grant awarded in 1996 by the Program for Cultural Cooperation Between Spain's Ministry of Culture and United States' Universities.

She also received a summer stipend in 1997 from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Hess joined the University faculty in 1995. She previously taught at the University of California at both Davis and Berkeley.