Fulbright Grantees Headed Overseas for 2025-26

MFA alumna and doctoral student head to Spain and Belgium

Two UIC alums and a current doctoral student will spend the 2025-26 school year abroad after accepting offers from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. 

Each year, the Fulbright student program selects recent college graduates, current graduate students or early-career professionals to travel overseas for graduate studies, research or teaching English in schools. It is the largest cross-cultural exchange program in the world.

Fulbright research applicants submit proposals for research projects that can be completed in one academic year. In all, five UIC graduates and current students were selected for the program this year. 

UIC finalists 

Keshav Gandhi is a previous Goldwater Scholarship recipient who did a research internship in Germany in the summer after his sophomore year at UIC. With his Fulbright grant, he will return to Germany, this time to the University of Cologne’s Institute for Computational Cancer Biology to extend his studies in computational cancer genomics.

“I would like to learn more about how we can use certain mathematical representations and computational approaches to unveil some of the biological underpinnings common in cancer,” Gandhi said. “Most importantly, I also want to conduct research that could someday improve the lives of cancer patients.” 

Gandhi, a graduate of UIC’s Guaranteed Professional Program Admissions Medical Scholars Program and the Honors College, said he’s looking forward to spending a full year on his own research project. His previous time in Germany was a short 10 weeks through the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, a German government-funded initiative that brings students from North America, Great Britain and Ireland to Germany for research in STEM fields.

“The yearlong program provides more time to carry a research project through to completion, and feasibility of your proposal is a crucial part of the Fulbright application,” Gandhi said. “That helped me grow as a researcher, too — setting realistic goals and determining how projects fit into the overall landscape of your field are both important skills.”

Zack Martin is a doctoral candidate in art history in the College of Architecture, Design and the Arts. He will study the legacy of Belgian colonialism through collections in the AfricaMuseum in Tervuren, Belgium.

The museum, developed in the 19th century to highlight a Belgian colony in Central Africa, underwent a rebranding following a renovation from 2013-18. 

Martin said he hopes his Fulbright study will provide a “much greater understanding of what motivated the museum’s feverish collection of natural history specimens and how contemporary museum visitors are reacting to the ‘new’ museum.”

He added, “I want to understand in much greater depth which groups of heritage stakeholders are motivated to visit Tervuren and whether or not they respond to the museum in distinct ways. Conducting heritage fieldwork is hugely important to me, and I hope to bring back not only significant archival finds to aid in the writing of my dissertation but also as many interview transcripts as I can so that I can analyze what motivates people to visit this site of difficult heritage.”  

Tamara Valdez received her master’s degree in studio art from the College of Architecture, Design and the Arts at UIC. She will research paper making traditions that date to the 17th century at paper mills in Catalonia, Molí de la Vila, in eastern Spain.  

The mills are among the last ones making paper by hand, she said. Valdez’s research will include learning how “the stories we tell shape what survives.

“Over the year, I will refine my own hand paper making skills and document the mill through archival research, oral histories and walks along the paper making routes in the region,” she said. “One of my goals is to publish an index of handmade paper made from the plants of Capellades and its surroundings.”

Valdez said the Fulbright program gives her an opportunity to participate in the paper making process and meet people who have perfected the art.

“Fulbright gives me the chance to immerse myself in a place so closely tied to the questions I care about,” she said. “It’s an opportunity I might not have again to do slow, relational and place-rooted work.”

In addition, two UIC alums were Fulbright finalists who were offered opportunities as teaching assistants in Taiwan; both declined. Fatima Jassim graduated with a degree in computer science from the College of Engineering and a minor in Arabic. She was also in the Honors College. Vidushi “Reva” Srivastava majored in neuroscience and graduated from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. She was a member of the Honors College and the Guaranteed Professional Program Admissions Medical Scholars Program.

Since 1946, the Fulbright Program has provided more than 400,000 participants from over 160 countries the opportunity to study, teach, research and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns. Fulbright alums include 61 Nobel Prize laureates, 89 Pulitzer Prize recipients and 40 who have served as heads of state or government.

For the original article: https://today.uic.edu/uic-fulbright-grantees-headed-overseas-for-2025-26-school-year/