Dear Fulbright 2011-12 Applicants,
I'm jim the zymurgist over from the Fulbright 2010-11 forum. I successfully applied for a 2010-11 Fulbright Full Grant to Germany.
Crimsonengineer recently contacted me with some questions and, after responding in PM, I thought I'd share some of the contents of that message with applicants who are currently in the process of drafting Statement of Grant Purposes (SGPs), and finding and securing affiliates. I'm sure there are a wealth of opinions and suggestions on these matters, many of them differing in method, so I here offer my experience regarding my SGP and finding my affiliate--securing an affiliate is (basically) essential when applying for the Fulbright Full Grant to Germany.
Hope this helps!
Best,
jim the zym
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Dear Crimsonengineer,
I think one of the most important steps in the Fulbright application process is determining the affiliates who are absolutely essential to your project. And I think that finding an affiliate and writing a good Statement of Grant Purpose (SGP) are fundamentally bound up with each other. Obtaining an affiliate not only means that you have, well, secured an affiliate, but it also gets you to think about (and articulate) the reason why your project MUST be executed from your proposed country, city, institution, and (in some cases) with a specific person at said institution. Having this reason in your SGP makes for a better (stronger) SGP than not having it.
If you've already narrowed down your affiliate list, good, lots of work is already done.
If you haven't -- or if you have and want some questions to think about -- then consider the following: applying for a Fulbright Full Grant is you saying that you absolutely need to be in, say, Berlin in order to execute your research project on, say, the ethics of transnational identity among inner-city youth. This means that one approach is: have some general idea about your project as you start writing your SGP, find an affiliate that uniquely matches up with your project, then incorporate that affiliate (in its various aspects) into your SGP. Determine where you and your project 'best fit' in Germany; this constitutes your list of potential affiliates. (For my part, my list of potential affiliates was quite short for reasons I'll soon explain.)
Here, the Fulbright Commission looks to see if your project can't be completed at some institution in the US (or your home country), if it can, then you don't really need to be in residence for one year in your proposed host country. Questions to think about: Can I complete my project at some library here in the US? (Answering 'yes' is not a good thing.) What does my affiliate have that I can find no where else in the world? Why do I need to physically be at my affiliate institution?
Your Statement of Grant Purpose should include why your project requires your physical presence at your affiliated institution, and how your project cannot be executed without that.
It took me hours and hours of (primarily) online research and (secondarily) asking professors in order to find leads on affiliates. Naturally, professors can provide a wealth of lead info, especially if they are familiar with your field in Germany. Mine weren't. My current adviser (in German) knows few people in my proposed field of research (history), so she was only able to provide me with one name. And, in all truth, that German professor would have probably agreed to be my affiliate. I didn't go that route however, because I wanted to be engaged in a project that interested me. That certain potential affiliate (though in history) was just too far afield when it came down to our respective research interests. So, I spent lots of time trawling the internet trying to figure out the city/institution at which I belonged. This took me a couple of weeks, but in the end I found a place that I thought, generally, fit with my interests, and, specifically, provided me with reasons for having to physically be in Germany for one year.
So, I drafted my SGP with my potential (and perfect) affiliate in mind. By the time I was ready to send out feeler-emails, I had completed a full, revised (but not final) draft of my SGP. This means that I had a very solid idea of my project and why I was proposing to specific individuals at my potential affiliate institution. In the end I sent feeler-emails to about 4 individuals which means that my approach resulted in me not casting a wide feeler-email net; but I hoped that it also meant that my first round of feeler-emails would have some impact. So, onto the feeler-emails.
By the time I started drafting my feeler-emails I already had completed and revised (and revised) my Statement of Grant Purpose. That means that I went through all of the above and (honestly) did not get around to sending out feeler-letters until sometime in September (which is too late). Get started early! This also means that I had found my compelling reason as to why I had to be at my proposed affiliate--which became the core of my project and my SGP. The drawbacks to this approach might be something like: I constructed a very narrow and specific project with a certain affiliate in mind, and what if my affiliate had not agreed to host me? or agreed too late? Then I would be at a total loss and I'm sure would not have made it past the first round of cuts. The benefits to this approach were: I spent all of my energy trying to get someone from my specifically chosen affiliate to host me, my Statement of Grant Purpose showed why I had to be there (specifically), and because my Statement was specifically tailored to that affiliate institution I thought that that upped the chances of someone responding to my feeler-emails. Someone (finally!) did.
I went with the 'all eggs in one basket' approach. That may not be for you. It was for me.
So, with all of this in mind I wrote my feeler-emails. It was one email. I drafted it, had someone copy-edit my German, had my adviser briefly look at it, then sent it out:
Dear Blahty Blah
¶1: My name is blah blah. I am currently studying at blah and am writing to you with the hope that you might agree to be my research mentor under the auspices of the Fulbright program. My proposed project is on fruit (some general term), and I am specifically interested on whether or not apples and oranges can be compared (one liner, specific description of your project--by now their interest should be peaked because they work in the same field of research).
¶2: My project specifically is blahty blah blah blaty blah (here a few, very tight sentences explaining your project). With this in mind I would like to conduct this research at your institution because your institution houses all manner of apples and oranges (here say why you need to be at that institution), and/or with you because your ground-breaking research in apple and orange comparison is essential to my project (here say why that person might be essential to your project).
¶3: If this interest you, I await with bated breath your answer and would be grateful for it (here, diplomatically and gently let them know that your ball is now graciously in their court; this is where you, in so many words, ask them to answer your email). In order to help you make your decision, I here attach my CV (attach your stellar CV to show them that you are awesome and that they'd love to have a young motivated individual like you around) and my proposed research statement (attach your fine-tuned research statement so they can see in detail what your project is all about). In the case that you're not interested in my awesome project, I would be grateful if you forwarded this to a colleague of yours that you think might be interested (here, this one is tricky, you may want to leave it out; but my thinking is, if they are not interested in my project, and I ask them very nicely/gently to forward this to someone they know who might be, then what's the harm?). If you have any questions or comments or whatevs please do not hesitate to contact me at blah@blahmail.com. I thank you for your time and consideration in this matter.
MfG,
Me, the awesome Zymurgist
Undergrad or grad, Germanistik
Public State University of Awesome Fruit
Also, don't be afraid to contact department administrators. As you may have already heard, these German profs are swamped with work and are often times reticent to take on research students--they just don't have the time usually (at least that's what the profs at my home institution warned me about). If you diplomatically email the department administrators and ask them to give your materials to that professor who just hasn't answered your feeler-email, your materials may land at the top of that professor's pile of to-do stuff; or maybe the department administrator will inform you that that professor has recently moved to another university and give you the name of someone else you might want to contact from the same department (which happened to me--I waited and waited for a response from someone, then emailed again, still nothing, then finally emailed the dept. administrator who was kind enough to inform me of that prof's move and give me some other leads).
I hope all of this helps. I remember the process well. Keep your head up. I'd be happy to answer any other questions you may have.
Best,
Zymurgist
