FLAS
Cornell Southeast Asia Program
Cornell University
8 Academic Year Scholarships4 Summer Scholarships
Burmese at level Beginner or above.
Indonesian at level Beginner or above.
Khmer, Central (Cambodia) at level Beginner or above.
Tagalog (Pilipino) at level Beginner or above.
Thai at level Beginner or above.
Vietnamese at level Beginner or above.
Details: The Southeast Asia Program (SEAP) at Cornell University is able to award eight competitive Southeast Asian language FLAS fellowships for the academic year. These are available for each of the following least commonly taught languages: Burmese, Indonesian, Khmer, Tagalog, Thai, and Vietnamese. Each of these is taught at four levels: beginning through advanced. Further this language instruction is available as directed studies upon request and the consent of the instructor to enable graduate students to develop the highly specialized and often technical language skills required for field research. The FLAS application calendar has been developed to coincide with the graduate school application process. It begins in early February for the next academic year with the posting of the announcement, due dates, criteria, and a link to the on-line application on SEAP's website. The same information is announced in the Office of Sponsored Programs' Newsletter, by a poster campaign on campus, and through the SEAP and other list serves that reach subscribers both on and off campus multiple times until the January deadline. SEAP's FLAS web page receives over 9000 hits annually. Letters, guidelines and forms are made available in hardcopy to over 80 departments across Cornell's campus encouraging them to identify potential students. A campus wide information meeting, announced on multiple websites and in the campus wide newspaper, is held in the fall for the next academic year and applications distributed. Advisors and language teachers encourage continuing graduate students taking Southeast Asian language courses to apply for FLAS. In February, SEAP's nineteen professorial and six language faculty review and rate all FLAS application packets which include an application, transcripts, GRE scores, three letters of recommendation, and the statement of purpose outlining the necessity for language training and proposed program of study. Simultaneously, SEAP's director contacts academic departments to discuss their departmental nominations of new and continuing students. Faculty members independently review and rate candidates from 1 (outstanding), to 5 (unacceptable). Ratings are averaged and candidates ranked from outstanding to unacceptable for discussion at a faculty meeting in late February. Faculty, evaluations are based on objective scores, subjective recommendations, academic promise and seriousness of intent. Final rankings are reached by consensus and take into consideration NRC priorities and students' academic disciplines, country or countries of interest, gender, and ethnic factors. Awardees, alternates and unsuccessful applicants are all notified in March and where applicable asked to accept by April 10th. Summer FLAS provide two awards to be pooled with the Southeast Asian Studies Summer Institute (SEASSI) at the U. of Wisconsin - Madison. Two additional summer FLAS are available to undergraduate students to attend SEASSI or an intensive in country summer language program in Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Cambodia, or the Philippines.