Through our FLAS Fellow Features, get to know some of the students who have recently received awards from UW-Madison’s FLAS-granting centers. Read about their experiences on the fellowship, their diverse areas of study, and how the fellowship helped them achieve their language and cultural competency goals. 
Katie Gabrick recently received a Master of International Public Affairs in the La Follette School of Public Affairs. Get to know this Summer 2024 FLAS fellow in their own words:
What language and level did you study with your FLAS award? What center awarded your fellowship?
I studied first-year Russian with my FLAS award. CREECA, or the Center for Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia, awarded me the fellowship.
How has receiving the FLAS fellowship impacted your overall academic experience?
Taking an intensive Russian course challenged me academically while building my confidence in my language-learning abilities. The FLAS fellowship offered me the opportunity to do something I am passionate about, learning languages, during my graduate school. At the beginning of my master’s, I set a goal to study a challenging language during the program, and because of the fellowship, I was able to learn a year’s worth of Russian during my last semester of graduate school.
What initially motivated you to apply for a FLAS fellowship?
I had already achieved fluency in French, my second language, and knew that I wanted to take coursework during my master’s program in a language that would be more difficult for me to learn as a native English speaker. Russian was among the languages that I wanted to learn, and the FLAS fellowship offered a perfect opportunity to get paid to learn a language, every lover of language-learning’s dream job. During my master’s program, I focused on energy and environmental policy, and Russian-speaking countries account for a large percentage of both oil and critical minerals production. I hope to work in international energy policy one day, and learning Russian makes me a better candidate for jobs within this area.
How has the FLAS fellowship helped you achieve your foreign language learning goals?
The FLAS fellowship has allowed me to achieve one of my goals for graduate school, which was to complete coursework in a less commonly taught language with geopolitical and significance, Russian. The fellowship enabled me to build a strong foundation in the Russian language from which I can now continue to study the language independently. I hope to eventually use both French and Russian in my career.
What summer study program did you participate in with your FLAS award? What were some of the highlights?
I did the first academic year of Russian at UW-Madison during an eight-week program this summer. One of the biggest highlights of the summer was the amount of progress I made every week. I learned more Russian in eight weeks than I ever imagined possible. I also loved getting to know the other students in my course and learning about the cultures of multiple Russian-speaking countries from our professors.
Interested in learning more about how the FLAS Fellowship can support your language and international study? Visit flas.wisc.edu!