Brenda Tooley, director of Knox College's Eleanor Stellyes Center for Global Studies, recently completed a Fulbright Scholar Fellowship in Bulgaria. While there, she taught literature in the English and American Studies Department and pursued ongoing research on attitudes toward the globalization of education and student and scholar mobility within countries facing demographic crises.

Through the prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholar program, Tooley was in Bulgaria during spring semester 2018, teaching courses, pursuing research, and completing writing projects at the University of Veliko Tarnovo. This marked the second time in her career that she was selected as a Fulbright Scholar. The first time was In 2010, also at the University of Veliko Tarnovo.

As a result of her most recent Fulbright experience, Tooley hopes to expand opportunities for Knox students and faculty to study in Bulgaria—through short-term study programs and faculty research partnerships, for example.

"Bulgaria is a beautiful, complex country. It has long been a crossroads and gateway to Europe, located as it is, adjacent to Turkey, Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, and Romania, with a Black Sea coastline connecting it with Russia and Central Asia, bordered on the north by the Danube River," said Tooley, who joined the Knox community in 2016.

"Bulgaria's culture combines influences from many civilizations and regions: Thracian, Byzantine, Ottoman, Central and Eastern European and Mediterranean."

Tooley is among more than 70 Knox students, faculty, and alumni who have earned various Fulbright awards since the program started in 1946, and she has extensive ties to the Fulbright program.

In the summer of 2017, she was one of 12 representatives from U.S. colleges and universities invited to the U.S. Study Abroad Capacity Building workshop, a weeklong seminar in Hungary that was organized by the Hungarian Fulbright Commission and funded by the U.S. State Department. The workshop was aimed at building and strengthening connections between institutions of higher education in the United States and Hungary. In addition, she was an instructor in the Fulbright International Summer Institute in Bulgaria during 2012 and 2014. She was a participant in a Fulbright-Hays Summer Seminar in Brazil in 2001. She served as a national peer reviewer for the Fulbright Scholar program (Western Europe section) from 2012-15.

Tooley also recently accepted an appointment to serve on the Institute of International Education's national screening committee for Fulbright U.S. Student English Language Teaching Assistantships. In that role, she will review applications from U.S. students (college seniors and recent graduates) who want to pursue study, research, or professional training through international placement via the Fulbright program as ETAs.

As director of the Stellyes Center, Tooley plays a key role in the global education of students and other members of the Knox College community. The Stellyes Center coordinates study abroad and off-campus programs for Knox students, about 50% of whom participate in study abroad and off-campus programs at some point in their undergraduate education. The Stellyes Center also encourages international study within the Knox curriculum, fosters faculty engagement in research with international components, promotes international travel and research by Knox students and faculty, and brings to campus distinguished guest speakers and scholars-in-residence with international perspectives.

Tooley has been deeply involved with the Syria Consortium for Higher Education in Crisis, an Institute of International Education initiative designed to help Syrian students pursue higher education in the United States, and has helped bring Syrian students to Knox.

In addition to directing the Stellyes Center, Tooley directs Knox's Peace Corps Preparatory Program, which offers a specialized curriculum to prepare students for Peace Corps or other international service, and she has assisted students and faculty members interested in applying for Fulbright opportunities.

The Fulbright Program is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and administered by the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES). The program sends American scholars and professionals to about 125 countries, where they teach, lecture, and conduct research in a wide variety of academic and professional fields.