Cavanaugh '12 Awarded Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Spain

Joseph Cavanaugh ’12, of Plymouth, Mass., has been awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Madrid, where he will teach English to Spanish high school students. A political science major, he also plans to pursue his interest in international politics while in Spain.

"Taking classes examining Spanish policies — especially those in regard to combating international terrorism, poverty, and unemployment — could significantly enhance my worldview and add to my understanding of similar problems in the United States," Cavanaugh said. "Given the fact that the United States has just recently begun developing policies on how to handle terrorist attacks on their own soil, for example, it has a significant amount to learn from Spain, a country that has been formulating strategies to counter separatist groups for years."

Cavanaugh is interested in pursuing a career in public service.

"I think that the Fulbright is an exceptional opportunity for me to enrich my perspective so that I may be more effective in politics or policy-making upon my return to the U.S., enabling me to build bridges both between countries and within communities," he said.

At Holy Cross, Cavanaugh was a member of the College Honors Program and Phi Beta Kappa honor society. He was involved in the Student Government Association, and held a variety of class officer positions, most recently vice president of the senior class. As a participant in the College's Washington Semester Program during the fall of 2010, he interned at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bi-partisan foreign policy think tank, where he worked in the Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Program.

"Thanks to the great service opportunities that Holy Cross provides, I've also been given the opportunity to volunteer in the past at Woodland Academy, a Worcester school comprised of 70 percent Latino students. In addition, I was fortunate enough to have the chance to travel with classmates to Tanzania during July of 2010 to assist in the construction of an education center being built for children of AIDS victims," he said.

Each year approximately 1,000 college students are awarded grants through the Fulbright Program, the U.S. government’s flagship program in international educational exchange. Fulbright grants are made to U.S. citizens and nationals of other countries for a variety of educational activities, primarily university lecturing, advanced research, graduate study and teaching in elementary and secondary schools. Since the program’s inception in 1946, more than 300,000 participants — chosen for their leadership potential — have had the opportunity to observe each other’s political, economic and cultural institutions.

Read about this year’s other Holy Cross Fulbright grant recipients: Mattea Cumoletti '12, Caroline Galiatsos '12, Daniel Geiger ’11, Eliza Gettel '12, Heidi Grek ’12, Maria Jaroszewicz ’12, Jaeyeon Lee ’12, Courtney Lesoon '12, George Matthews ’12 and Peter Renehan ’12.