Category: Fulbright & Finland

Finland-A New Type of Trip and a New Beginning

You may not have heard about The Fulbright Distinguished Awards for Teaching, and if you have you may not realize just how prestigious it is. I actually fell into that category when my wife, Robyn first applied for it. Contenders have to put together a comprehensive project application that describes their area of study, why it is important, how it will be conducted, and finally an action plan that implements their gathered knowledge to enrich the methods of instruction in their home school districts. Of course, this is a simplified overview; creating the actual project and then going through the various phases of the application process/meeting the requirements was quite arduous and took about a year.

Every email that Robyn received was opened with equal measures of dread and excitement. And wouldn’t you know it? Robyn made it through each phase in turn much to our surprise, until finally, she made it to the very last evolution: a telephone conversation with a panel of members from the selection committee. Robyn sat in her car in her school’s parking lot (the only quiet and private place available to talk) and prepared herself to answer a lot of deep and very searching questions about her proposal. Positivity was the key, but would they understand her project? Was it worthy? Would it be a viable option and help make her district better in the eyes of the Fulbright committee? She called me to see if her phone was working. It was. Time lengthened and the excitement and nervousness grew with each passing moment. Her cell rang and it was time to shine. Five minutes later it was done. Why so short? Was it simply a matter of determining if the person was truly who they said they were, or did she not manage to generate interest in her project? Self doubts set in. Several days later, Robyn received official confirmation that she had made it and was now the proud recipient of the Fulbright Distinguished Award in Teaching, one of only 35 teachers across the entire USA. More information was to follow…

And it did. Robyn was awarded Finland as her host nation. This was good news, although for a southern California girl starting her study sometime in January, Hawaii may have been more comfortable. Perhaps even Tahiti…However, Finland is the best choice for robyn’s project as it is consistently ranked as one of the best (if not the best) educational systems in the world, perfect for Robyn’s project which focuses on inclusion for students with disabilities specifically, Autism.

It turns out that Robyn was indeed allowed to bring her husband and family with her. The Fulbright Award even provides some financial support in the form of modest housing and cost of living stipends that if managed frugally, and supplemented by our family, provide just enough capital for us to live in our new country. We shall homeschool our two children while based in the beautiful university town of Jyvaskala in the country’s central Lake District, a few hours north of Helsinki. We shall be in Finland for 6 months in total and will travel the country at every opportunity. This is a new type of trip for us as we shall have a long period of time to immerse ourselves in this very culturally interesting location. Sure, we will be in a small apartment in the coldest and darkest time of the year. Yet this is part of the allure, and the Finnish people appear to spend as much time outside in the middle of winter as they do during the warmer summer months. This is great for us as we are definitely an outdoorsy family. There is also a saying that I’ve been repeating to my daughter who has zero body fat to keep her warm, “There is no bad weather, only bad clothing.” In other words, time to learn how to layer clothing! Finland, here we come!