Two SU Faculty Are Named Fulbright Scholars

SALISBURY, MD---Two Salisbury University professors have been awarded Fulbright Scholar grants, one of higher education’s highest honors, from the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

Dr. Andrew Sharma, associate professor in the Communication and Theatre Arts Department, is lecturing on media research, advertising communication and television program production at Guru Jambheshwar University in Hisar, India this fall.  Dr. Michael Waters, English Department professor, lectures on American Studies at Alexandru Ioan Cuza University in Iasi, Romania in spring 2007.

The professors are among some 800 U.S. faculty and professionals traveling abroad this year through the Fulbright Scholar Program, America’s flagship international educational exchange program. Established in 1946, its purpose is to build mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the rest of the world.

The program operates in more than 150 countries and recipients are selected for achievement and demonstrated leadership potential. Since its inception, approximately 102,900 Americans have studied, taught or researched abroad and 170,600 students, scholars and teachers from other countries have engaged in similar activities in the U.S.  Sharma and Waters join the ranks of prominent Fulbright alumni including Aneesh Raman, CNN Baghdad correspondent and Ruth Simmons, Brown University President.

Sharma, who is originally from India where he attended the University of Bombay, earned his Ph.D. in mass communications from Syracuse University, NY. He taught at State University of New York in Albany, NY and Ball State University in Muncie, IN before joining the SU faculty.

Waters, an award winning poet, previously taught at Ohio University, where he earned his Ph.D. He specializes in creative writing and American literature and was a visiting professor at the University of Athens, Greece. Author of Darling Vulgarity and seven other books of poetry, his works have appeared in publications including The Yale Review and Rolling Stone. He has edited four books and is a sought-after reader across the U.S. and abroad.

For more information about the Fulbright Program visit http://exchanges.state.gov or contact Heidi Manley at 202-453-8534 or academic@state.gov.