Savannah Muir, a senior economics and mathematics major from Gaithersburg, MD, has been selected to receive a Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant for the 2017-2018 academic year. She will serve as an English Teaching Assistant in India.
The Fulbright Program is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government and is designed to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries. The Fulbright U.S. Student Program provides grants for individually designed study/research projects or for English Teaching Assistant Programs, which place Fulbrighters in classrooms abroad. Muir also plans to research the education system in India from an economic perspective.
Muir’s areas of interests include economic empowerment and education, and in the spring of 2016, she worked as an intern for Parvati Swayamrojgar (PSW), a microfinance institution in India that provides those living in the slums access to financial services. She designed a questionnaire to assess the microfinance practices at PSW, interviewed 60 families, and created an analytical report of the results. At Rhodes, Muir works as a teaching assistant in the mathematics department and a Rhodes Student Associate for the college’s Crossroads to Freedom project.
"Economically, India’s huge population and rapid recent growth could lead it to be a huge economic power in the coming years, and the education system of a country is one of the key factors in its development,” says Muir. “Working in the education system and visiting and researching multiple schools will give me an invaluable perspective on some of the ways the Indian education system is affecting its growth. In the future, I hope to work in development economics."
Muir is a graduate of Magruder High School in Rockville, MD.
Rhodes recently was recognized by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs as a top producing institution for Fulbright U.S. Students for 2016-2017.
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