Pruszko ’10 Awarded Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Bulgaria

Olivia Pruszko ’10, of Monroe, Conn., has been awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Bulgaria. She will stay in Dobrich, located in northeastern Bulgaria 18 miles west of the Black Sea. Pruszko will teach English at Dobrich’s English Language High School.

A Spanish major, language has long been an interest to Pruszko. Since her parents emigrated from Poland, the first language she learned was Polish.

Pruszko also has a deep interest in education. She has completed 60 hours observing, tutoring and helping a middle-school Spanish teacher and high school Spanish and ESL teacher with homework, assignments, lesson plans and activities for their classes.

She plans on studying education and Spanish in graduate school, and hopes to work in education administration or become the superintendant of a school district.

At Holy Cross, Pruszko is captain of the women’s varsity indoor and outdoor track and field teams, co-chair of Modern Languages and Literatures student advisory committee department, member of the National Spanish Honor Society (Sigma Delta Pi), and fall orientation leader for incoming freshmen and transfer students. She has tutored at the Heard Street Elementary School, Burncoat Middle School, and Burncoat High School.

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 250,000 participants — chosen for their leadership potential — have had the opportunity to observe each other’s political, economic and cultural institutions.