The Center for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies congratulates its five Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship recipients for summer 2025.

Emma Clute will study 3rd-year Russian at Middlebury College. She is an undergraduate Linguistics and Spanish major with a minor in Russian. Emma's long-term career goal is to use her language skills to become a translator working for the U.S. Department of State.

Kelly Gallagher, a graduate student in the Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures, has been awarded FLAS to continue her study of advanced Russian in Middlebury College's graduate program. She aspires to a career in academia as a professor of Russian language and literature and is using her summer study to prepare to teach Russian 1101 in the autumn semester.

Sarah Hohman, an MA student in Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies, will study 2nd-year Polish through the University of Pittsburgh's Summer Language Institute in Krakow, Poland. Sarah aspires to a career coordinating study abroad and exchange programs in Eastern Europe and Eurasia, focusing especially on countries that have been underserved by such programs in the past.

Angelo Juarez, an undergraduate double-majoring in Biomedical Engineering and Russian with minors in Aviation Engineering and Military Science, will study 4th-year Russian at Middlebury College. He aspires to practice medicine in the US military. 

Devon Rancourt has been awarded a FLAS Fellowship to study 2nd-year Serbian through the American Councils Balkan Language Initiative in Belgrade, Serbia. She is pursuing an interdisciplinary master's degree in Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies. Devon has previously studied Russian, Bulgarian and Macedonian, and she aspires to use these skills in the education sector, expanding access to the study of Balkan languages and linkages between the US and the region.

The summer FLAS Fellowship program awards fellowships to undergraduate, graduate, and professional students who are seeking to complete an intensive language program over the summer term. Intensive programs meet 15-20 hours per week for at least six weeks, meaning that students complete the equivalent of a whole year’s language study over the course of a couple of months. The fellowship provides a stipend and tuition benefit to students. Funding for FLAS comes from a U.S. Department of Education Title VI grant to CSEEES. The application for summer 2026 fellowships will open in fall 2025.