Five members of the Portland State University faculty and one student received Fulbright Scholar awards for the upcoming academic year.
Kelly Titkemeier, a graduate student in World Languages and Literatures working on her master’s in German Studies, received a student award to support research at the German Literature Archive in Marbach am Neckar, Germany.
Titkemeier will research the work of Johanna Schopenhauer—a prolific German author of the early 19th century whose work includes novels, novellas, travelogs, an art history monograph, a biography, and an unfinished memoir. Kelly will incorporate her research into her thesis, which she plans to defend in Fall 2024.
“I was drawn to researching Johanna Schopenhauer because I identify with her,” Titkemeier said. “Both of us changed the trajectories of our lives in our 40s. That’s when Schopenhauer began her writing career and when I began work on my master’s in German Studies.”
The Fulbright program, operated by the U.S. State Department, partners with more than 160 countries worldwide to offer international educational and cultural exchange programs for students, scholars, artists, teachers, and professionals of all backgrounds to study, teach, or pursue important research and professional projects.
This year, five members of PSU’s faculty received awards, up from two last year.
Melody Valdini, professor of political science in the College of Urban and Public Affairs, is headed to Belgium where she will study women leaders in the European Union. As the 2023-24 Fulbright-Schuman Distinguished Scholar, she will teach classes about women’s leadership at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium. She will also conduct research on women leaders’ policy negotiating strategies and the decision-making processes for ascending the leadership ladder in the European Union.
Tomas Cotik, associate professor of violin in the College of the Arts, will conduct research at the Conservatory of Music of Aragon in Zaragoza, Spain where he intends to study Spanish music and different approaches to the composers Piazzolla and Bach. His work will also explore new perspectives on repertoire, interpretation, and presentation formats through a series of multidisciplinary media projects.
As with his performance during the Portland Winter Light Festival, Cotik aims to democratize classical music and use technology to communicate with the community through music.
Tami Lasseter Clare, associate professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, was selected as the Fulbright Spain-Greece Joint Research and Teaching Scholar. Clare is an art conservation expert and Director of the Regional Laboratory for the Science of Cultural Heritage Conservation and she will use her time in the Mediterranean to study sustainable coatings to protect metalwork against corrosion. In Greece, she will partner with the University of West Attica to work with museums that have been forced to relax their standards on indoor temperature and humidity controls due to energy rationing prompted by the war in Ukraine. In Madrid, Clare will work within the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Metalúrgicas, a part of the Spanish National Research Council.
Christopher Campbell, associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, will go to Loughborough University in England in fall 2024 to study that country’s diversion efforts for people who use controlled substances and how those efforts are playing in the public and among law enforcement officers. This work will augment the research Campbell and his colleagues have been doing to document the effects of substance decriminalization that Oregon ushered in with the passage of Measure 110 in 2021.
Interim Dean of the College of Urban and Public Affairs and Portland Professor of Environmental and Natural Resources Policy Jennifer Allen, will be advising as a Fulbright Specialist on the development of a carbon neutrality plan for the Universidad Tecnológica Nacional in Argentina. This dovetails with her recent research on how collaborative governance approaches can be used to address challenging issues including climate change
It’s difficult to predict how many Fulbright scholarships will be awarded year to year, said Debra Clemans, who manages the Fulbright process at PSU in the Office of Global Engagement & Innovation. She encourages students and faculty to participate in online training sessions to get information about applying for a Fulbright award. PSU hosted a session April 7th and a recording will be posted online at www.pdx.edu/fellowships/fulbright-scholars-program.