Dr. Kevin Graziano receives distinction of being Fulbright Specialist candidate

By Anne Browne
NSC’s School of Education is proud to announce that Dr. Kevin Graziano, Associate Professor, has received the distinction of being a candidate for the Fulbright Specialist Roster. The Fulbright Specialist Program (FSP) is designed to award grants to U.S. faculty and professionals in select disciplines to participate in projects at colleges and universities in more than 100 countries. Fulbright Specialists develop and implement programs that strengthen critical needs of overseas higher education institutions. Such programs may include teacher training, short-term lecturing, conducting seminars, special conferences or workshops, curriculum planning and institutional and/or faculty planning.
The Fulbright Specialist Program is a highly competitive program in which candidates are reviewed by peers in the same discipline and by the J. William Fulbright Scholarship Board. Applicants must have a Ph.D. or equivalent professional/terminal degree at the time of the application plus a minimum of five years of post-doctoral teaching or professional experience in the field in which you are applying.
Dr. Graziano described his project as an opportunity for professional development at an overseas institution in the areas of teacher training, active learning, and photovoice, a form of participatory action research that utilizes documentary photography and storytelling. He continues, I have conducted and published several photovoice studies with English language learners, gay and lesbian students, inner-city first year teachers, pre-service teachers, and high school students enrolled in an economics course. Specifically, I am interested in offering training to international colleagues on active learning teaching strategies for diverse populations and photovoice, the latter including its theoretical underpinnings, methodology, classroom implementation, strengths and weaknesses, and use as a form of needs assessment and teaching strategy.
Dr. Graziano’s goals are to share new and effective teaching approaches with international colleagues and to learn from one another more ways to improve teacher training. He is contacting universities in Asia, Europe, and South America to obtain a host institution.
How will this benefit the students at NSC and the community? Dr. Graziano responds, The interaction and new knowledge gained from my participation in the program will enhance my course content and delivery of instruction at NSC. The outcomes will be shared with the NSC community both online and in-person via the NSC website and a professional development workshop. Dr. Graziano will bring recognition to NSC throughout this program.
The opportunity to live and work overseas is not a new one for Dr. Graziano. In 1997, he taught English as a Second Language in the School of Medicine at Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. In 2000 and 2003, he conducted two participatory research studies in South Africa. Dr. Graziano was also invited by the South African Department of Education in 2003 to facilitate a train-the-trainer HIV prevention workshop to township educators.
For more information on the Fulbright Specialist Program, please visit the website: http://www.cies.org