qes

Good to hear other people haven't gotten theirs either. I sent mine in early April, too, and haven't heard anything. *sigh* But I got the grant authorization thingy before sending in the medical forms, so I guess there's no reason to be antsy about the clearance.

I'll be moving with my husband & baby (he'll be 7 months when we arrive). Can't wait to meet you! Did you get the apartment through sssb? I'm registered on there, but will probably not have enough queue days for an apartment that's big enough for the three of us. Been checking blocket.se and bostaddirekt.com for sublets, mostly.

The way it ended up working for me (Sweden) was this: They said either they could book the flight or I could book my own, if it was cheaper than what their travel agent could get. I enquired about SAS (given the Fly America Act), and they said I *could* book SAS because it belonged to the "Star Alliance" even though the flights in question weren't listed as codeshared. I sent them my itinerary and they approved it. I booked. When I get to Sweden, I bring with me a copy of the itinerary, my credit card statement and my boarding pass. The amount of the flight is added on to my first monthly stipend. To mackiehattie: I didn't apply for the grant you asked about (and didn't get any of the other grants I did apply for). However, I believe that if the grant covers things besides day-to-day living expenses and travel (i.e. if it covers research expenses, conference travel, etc.) that you can use those portions of the grant. By the way, where in Sweden will you be? I'm going to be in Stockholm, and am currently sending about 4-5 emails a day about apartments without any luck yet. *sigh*

So, has anyone found a good way around the Fly America Act? If it were just me going, I wouldn't care since Fulbright will cover the whole thing for us, but I want to travel with my husband & baby, and Fulbright doesn't pay for them. Flying with Scandinavian Airlines is about $750 per person, roundtrip (we're booking to come home in December for Christmas, that's why its so cheap -- already checked and the commission will gladly cover that instead of the "final" trip home). The cheapest American carrier (Continental) is about $1000 per person. Kind of a pain in the neck. SAS sometimes codeshares with United, but not on these flights (grr!) I emailed the Fulbright Commission in Sweden (since they seem responsible for this stuff), but I'd like to get your collective wisdom on the matter! :-)

Before I got anything at all from IIE in NY, I got a grant authorization from Sweden, which I signed & returned immediately. About a week later I got the letter from IIE with the medical clearance. I just sent back the medical clearance today. Today in the mail I got further information from the Fulbright Commission in Sweden, with information on how to get a visa, how to make travel arrangements, etc. Since the info came from Sweden, I'm guessing that none of this info is the same across countries, and, hence, wouldn't be pertinent to you. But I'm so glad I got this stuff today, so that I can start making travel plans, etc. (although I still had several questions after getting this info -- mostly because I'm trying to figure out how to travel with my husband & baby -- moving abroad is so much more complicated with a kid, hehe)

Thanks so much. I felt really idiotic once I realized what I had done.

Ok, stupid question. I somehow accidently handed over the paper that had the address we're supposed to send the medical clearance form to to my dr. (it was stapled to the physician's instructions). Is it just the IIE address in NYC?

I (research, Sweden) ONLY received a snail-mail letter. No email.

It worked the same way at our school. We also got tips on improving our apps before they got sent on to New York. I'm sure it helps a lot, as our school has lots of Fulbrights every year.

I got a white envelope (from Sweden) in addition to the manila envelope. But, in any case, perhaps all of the Europe envelopes from NYC (like mine and mkurti) are the same?

Mine from NYC was 8.5" x 11' Manila envelope with about 5 sheets of paper in it.

I know that the grant has to go through the full process with both countries and be approved by both countries (I looked into this because I considered doing a multi-country grant -- yeah right I'm going to risk getting rejected by one and not the other though, hehe), but that they only get one grant. I'm not sure how it works if its awarded, though -- maybe they get partial grants from each country?

I don't know much about non-academia, sorry! But I don't know if anyone suggested this, but it seems like this is just the kind of thing that the Peace Corps is looking for. Have you looked into that?

I just want to echo what a few folks have said on here. Grad school has also for me involved a lot of (a) waiting and ( rejection. Both of these things, I think, are simply facts of life for academics. You have to wait to hear about grants, wait to hear about funding (my funding has also been semester-to-semester for the 4 years I've been here -- things have always worked out, but I've never had guarantees, and sometimes things came down to the wire). I've had articles rejected (pretty harshly), I've been rejected for grants/fellowships that I thought I was a shoe-in for, etc and it sucks, but its part of being an academic. You sort of have to learn to get used to it. For this project, too, I was totally rejected for one grant (SSRC), was an alternate for another (American-Scandinavian Foundation) and one granting-agency decided not to fund anyone due to the economy (American-Swedish Institute) before being accepted by Fulbright IIE. My advisor told me my first year of grad school that what truly separates the wheat from the chaff in academia is persistence. I believe it. So, just hang in there.

This is a medical clearance question for those who have been accepted (specifically if anyone has accompanying dependents). They only sent one form and the letter doesn't seem to ask for a form for dependents, but the instructions to physicians say something about evaluating the health of accompanying dependents... So, I'm understandably confused. Does anyone know if accompanying dependents need their own medical clearance? I emailed the folks at IIE, but I figured I'd ask y'all, too. (My husband, who has his own income so is not a dependent, and my infant son, who *is* a dependent, are coming along)