July 12, 2022
Fulbright teaching assistantship in Taiwan beckons history major Sara Conway ’21
By Vicki-Ann Downing ’21G
After her first year at Providence College, Sara Conway ’21 got a head start on international study with five weeks in Bath, England, through the Advanced Studies in England summer program. She explored Bath Abbey, Castle Corfe, Glastonbury Abbey, and Stonehenge — all locations of interest to a history major with an art history minor.
Next on her agenda was the college’s first-ever Maymester trip to South Korea in 2020. But then came COVID-19, and Conway went home to Westchester County, N.Y., where she remained, taking courses remotely, until she returned to PC for commencement in May 2021.
It wasn’t the college experience she planned, but Conway never stopped thinking about international travel. During her senior year, she applied to the Fulbright Program, the flagship international program of the U.S. government, hoping to teach English in South Korea. When she was unsuccessful, she decided to try again the following year, this time to Taiwan — and in April was offered an English teaching assistantship to that country.
Conway is one of five Providence College graduates selected to participate in the Fulbright program for the 2022-2023 academic year, the most students in college history. The others are Evan Diliberto ’22 (Slovak Republic), Grace Maffucci ’22 (Mexico), Jesus Maldonado ’18, ’21G (Colombia), and Elisabeth Sudbey ’21 (South Korea).
She is expected to arrive in early August to teach in an elementary school in Changhua County, a densely populated major industrial center on Taiwan’s west coast. She is looking forward to the cultural experience. In addition to art history, she had minors in Asian studies and in business and innovation, and she studied four semesters of Mandarin Chinese with Xiaojun Zhang, M.Ed.
“I think I love learning Mandarin because it is such a visual and artistic language,” said Conway, who was adopted from China. “It’s like painting a word with meaning.”
English is spoken in Taiwan in the large cities and tourist centers, such as Taipei, but not in more rural areas. Conway is looking forward to the immersive experience and to learning about Taiwanese culture and history.
“There are a little over 100 in my cohort,” Conway said. “We have an online group chat in a messaging app, Line, where we put all of our questions. Some of the prior Fulbright English teaching assistants are on there to help.”
Since September 2021, Conway has worked as a marketing assistant at Scholastic, the children’s book publisher in New York City. If not for the Fulbright, she would have continued to work in the publishing industry or become a literacy coach in an elementary school.
“In my Fulbright application I honed in on the idea of bringing visual elements and art into the classroom,” Conway said. “I’m a visual, art-driven person. So I focused on art in the classroom and emphasizing how art can tell a story. Last summer, I took a few visual literacy classes. There was one course about how to help young children read — where do you start, the techniques you use, how to strengthen the foundation for reading. For the Fulbright application, I tried to make sure my personal statement, my statement of purpose, and my overall experiences tied together in a central point.”
“It definitely helped, going through the application experience the year before,” Conway said. “I knew what I wanted to improve. And it helps that my mother is an English teacher. She helped me with the ideas and editing.”
Conway’s uncle, Gerald Conway ’85, is a PC alumnus who kept the college’s basketball and hockey teams, and its signature Development of Western Civilization Program, on her radar growing up. Conway was accepted into the Liberal Arts Honors Program and graduated summa cum laude.
A history major, she especially appreciated courses on early American history with Stephen Carl Smith, Ph.D., and on Asian history with D. Colin Jaundrill, Ph.D. Along with Rene A. Orquiza, Ph.D., they helped with her Fulbright application.
“I honestly love what I learn,” Conway said. “In art history, each class I took was my favorite. I took a modern art class my junior year with Dr. Deborah Johnson. That was fascinating to learn about because when I was younger, I was confused by modern art. I was able to learn about the thought process and from the conversations that came out of those classes as well.”
Conway was arts and entertainment editor of The Cowl, PC’s student newspaper. She joined the staff during her first year at PC and was involved for four years, writing about books and music. The summer after her graduation from PC, she was able to explore methods of storytelling through a social media internship with the Asia Society’s AsiaStore in New York City and a remote internship at the literary agency Triada US.
She volunteers with Apex for Youth in New York City, a nonprofit that provides educational opportunities for underserved Asian and immigrant youth from low-income families. She helps children in third, fourth, and fifth grades with art activities — work she described in her Fulbright application.
Her family hopes to be able to visit her in Taiwan, but the country’s borders have been closed due to the pandemic.
“We’ll be monitoring the situation,” Conway said. “I am excited to explore Changhua County and to travel around Taiwan and Asia, pandemic regulations permitting.”
