Lynn Janik has been to every continent except for Antarctica, but she has never been to Mexico. But that will change this summer because the Spanish and language arts teacher at L.J. Hauser Junior High School in Riverside will spend a month in Mexico as one of only 15 teachers from across the country to be selected for a Fulbright-Hays Seminars Abroad Award to study “Mexico in the 21st Century: Dealing with Social and Cultural Diversity.”
Janik will join 14 other teachers from all over the United States, traveling through eight southern Mexican states during July. Traveling with a professor in a van they will visit archaeological sites, schools, museums, natural parks and indigenous communities and markets. There will be a special emphasis on expressions of Mexican folk culture such as the production of handmade crafts, traditional cuisine, music, medicine and religious practices.
“Everything we do I would imagine will revolve around somehow enlightening us about the Mexican culture, and I think they really want to paint the authentic portrait, which is why we’re traveling around quite frequently, because they want us to have well-rounded view,” Janik said.
The program is administered and paid for by the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board and the U.S. Department of Education.
Janik, who taught English in Japan for two years before coming to Hauser four years ago, loves to travel.
“I’m really interested in traveling and broadening my horizons, and inevitably bring that back to the classroom,” Janik said.
But she has never made it to Mexico.
“I’ve been saving it actually, because I didn’t want just the resort feel,” Janik said. “I wanted to get an in-depth look, and I couldn’t quite figure out how to do that feasibly with some of the political situations. I guess safety was a concern, but then I definitely wanted something that would help me as a Spanish teacher, so this turned out to be a great deal.”
The Fulbright-Hays Seminars Abroad Awards are open to teachers of grades kindergarten through 12 who have at least three years of teaching experience in the United States.
This was the first year Janik was eligible for the award, and she decided to apply thinking that it was a real long shot.
“I’ve always known about Fulbright, but I thought it was one of those unattainable goals. But I thought, ‘What the heck, I’ll just apply,'” Janik said.
It was an extensive application. She filled out a long questionnaire, wrote three essays and submitted two letters of recommendation.
On March 7 she came home from school and had a fat envelope waiting for her.
“I was completely floored,” Janik said. “Ecstatic, but I kind of had to read it a couple of times just to make sure I wasn’t missing it.”
Janik says that the seminar should help her teach Spanish, but she hopes that it will also help her relate better to students with a Mexican heritage.
“For the Spanish classes, obviously, there will be tangible cultural tidbits that I’ll have,” Janik said. “For language arts we have a diverse community attending Hauser, so hopefully in my language arts classes I can either just bring short stories that might help some students connect with the characters, or if there is a student transitioning who might need a little more support in terms of a varied school system or a family background, I might have more insight to help that student out.”
This version corrects information about who is eligible to receive a Fulbright-Hays Seminars Abroad Award.