WSU faculty receive Fulbright U.S. Scholars awards

Two Washington State University faculty members received Fulbright U.S. Scholars awards to teach and conduct research abroad in the upcoming academic year.

Professor Benjamin Shors, of the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication, will work with students to improve rural journalism in Albania. Professor Sindhuja Sankaran, of the College of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences, will conduct research in India on using sensing and automation to measure crop traits.

Sankaran, who works in the Department of Biological Systems Engineering, will be based at the International Crops Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics in Hyderabad, India. Her research will focus on phenomics, where she will evaluate the agronomic and physiological traits of plants, and how these traits can be measured remotely through ground sensors or unmanned aerial vehicles. Sankaran noted it's a new field and such a knowledge exchange could benefit everyone involved.

"We are not to an extent that all of us know what everyone else is doing," she explained. "How can we learn from each other?"

Sankaran said she's especially pleased that her Fulbright award is a flex program, allowing her to make multiple shorter trips to India rather than one multi-month experience. "Not many people know about this opportunity," she said.

Shors will engage in a more traditional Fulbright U.S. Scholars program and relocate to Durrës, Albania for five months. He'll be based at Aleksandër Moisiu University of Durrës.

"My interest has always been in rural issues and rural journalism," said Shors, who is chair of the Department of Journalism and Media Production at the Murrow College. "The Albania project is building on those experiences by helping journalism students there learn how to tell meaningful, nuanced and accurate stories about rural life."

He noted that Albania, a former Communist Bloc nation, is seeking European Union membership. "As an EU ascension country, part of that is shoring up press freedom issues and press infrastructure issues, and that includes rural populations," Shors said.

The Fulbright program was established in 1946 by the U.S. State Department for educational and cultural exchange. The Fulbright U.S. Scholars Program is for university faculty, researchers, administrators and professionals to teach or conduct research or professional projects abroad. The Fulbright U.S. Student Program allows recent college graduates, graduate students and early-career professionals to study, conduct research or teach English internationally.