Titled "Analysis of Cultural Motivations for Sustainability in Central Europe," Roman aims to investigate how sustainable infrastructure is implemented within Austria. Areas of interest that Roman plans to research include low-emission public transit, pedestrian-focused city layouts, and passively designed buildings. Coming from an integrative engineering background, Roman feels well suited for conducting research in a field that combines scientific processes with cultural and social influences to better understand how Austria has become such a prominent leader in sustainability. Personal motivation for this proposal comes from Roman's belief that sustainable design is not only a technical field but also a social movement; Austria's history of implementing passive design into its infrastructure and leadership in passive building standards highlight a call to action by its government and public. The goal of Roman's research is to evaluate the impact of environmentally focused initiatives across different communities in Austria. Following the grant year, Roman hopes to use his research and newfound experiences as tools that will strengthen his perspective as he pursues a master's degree in environmental engineering.

Julian Gillilan is a doctoral candidate in the department of history advised by Professor Gerald Steinacher. His dissertation examines Austrian Pan-Germanism and Austro-Slavism in fin de siècle Vienna. This research is primarily based on German and Czech-language archival materials. Julian completed doctoral comprehensive field exams in Central European history, modern European history, genocide studies, and the history of empire. He is an alum of Bowling Green State University, where he received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in German studies and history.

Isabelle Glander recently graduated from the College of the Holy Cross with a degree in economics. As a 2026–27 US Fulbright student (Combined Grant), she is spending her year in Innsbruck teaching English at a secondary school and conducting research at the University of Innsbruck. Her research explores Austria’s higher-education system and its relationship to economic mobility, labor-market outcomes, and migration, with a particular interest in what the United States might learn from the Austrian experience.

Ryan is pursuing a Community-Based Combined Grant for the 2026–2027 program year in which he will serve as an US teaching assistant, pursue coursework in earth sciences at BOKU University, and volunteer with CliMates Austria to educate and empower young Austrians on climate policy and action. Through these experiences, Ryan hopes to develop an international perspective on climate change that will equip him to implement climate mitigation strategies that are globally informed yet locally grounded. In the future, he intends to pursue a career in climate adaptation and/or mitigation.

Austin Chales Gregory is an international relations graduate from Alabama. He earned his BA in communication studies from the University of North Alabama and his MA in international relations from University College Dublin. In 2023–2024, he served as a Fulbright English teaching assistant in Taiwan, where he developed a lasting connection to the country and began actively learning Mandarin.

Austin is currently a US Fulbright student studying in the Diploma Programme (DLG) at the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna. His academic interests include international development, humanitarian affairs, governance, migration, and conflict resolution. While in Vienna, he is continuing his language studies in Mandarin while learning French and German. He is particularly interested in conflict studies, food insecurity, and the role of diplomacy in addressing global challenges.

Grayden Holliday is a recent graduate from Washington and Lee University in Virginia, where he earned a bachelor's degree in biochemistry and concurrently majored in German with a minor in music. For his grant, Grayden will be working on a computational enzyme design project at the Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) with the support of Dr. Gustav Oberdorfer, a specialist in the protein design field. The focus of Grayden's project is to design a reductive aminase—a well-characterized enzyme class with the ability to accelerate medically relevant chemical reactions—from scratch via a method developed by Dr. Oberdorfer’s lab. Thereafter, he will modify elements of the method to incorporate new considerations into the design process centered around energy dynamics and allostery. Allostery refers to minute changes in protein structure in response to binding to other molecules. Following his Fulbright grant, Grayden will be pursuing a PhD in biochemistry with a focus on protein design at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle, where he hopes to draw upon the scientific connections he built while in Austria to open new avenues for cooperation in his personal research and the work of his lab group. Outside of research, Grayden is an avid rock climber and hiker, and he greatly enjoys making music and attending local performances.

Yoshi Weinberg (they/them) is a multi-faceted flutist, harpist, and composer based in NYC. Lauded for their “sublime tone” and “creative interpretation and technical virtuosity” (I Care If You Listen), Yoshi is a dedicated performer of contemporary and experimental works and has performed as a soloist across North America and Europe. They are artistic director and flutist of NYC-based experimental music ensemble InfraSound. They perform regularly on Broadway as a substitute for Reed 1(Wood Flute Soloist) on The Lion King and have been involved in countless experimental theater and opera productions in NYC and Minneapolis. Yoshi frequently performs with new music ensembles Contemporaneous, Talea, and ChamberQUEER and has performed as a guest artist with Ensemble Signal and the Da Capo Chamber Players, among many others. Yoshi is a doctoral candidate in music (ABD) at The Graduate Center (CUNY), having finished studies with Robert Dick. Their research is on the composer Julius Eastman and queer performance practice. They received their MM in contemporary performance from Manhattan School of Music with Tara O’Connor and their BM in flute performance from Saint Olaf College with Catherine Ramirez.

Danielle Wolfson, from Flemington, New Jersey, will conduct research in Vienna, Austria, focused on Holocaust-era provenance and the personal property—including jewelry and family heirlooms—looted from Jewish communities under the Nazi regime.

The Fulbright-Mach Award will support Danielle's research into the histories and provenance of these deeply personal objects. Her work will contribute to a broader understanding of cultural property lost through Nazi persecution and the complex questions surrounding ownership, restitution, and remembrance.

As a cultural heritage specialist, Danielle has gained international experience in the United States, Germany, Greece, and Jordan. Danielle graduated with departmental honors from Drexel University's Pennoni Honors College, earning her bachelor's degree in museum studies and double minors in political science and art history. She recently earned her master's degree in cultural heritage management from the University of Pennsylvania. Her upcoming work in Austria will further expand that experience while allowing her to pursue specialized research at the intersection of provenance, cultural heritage, and Holocaust studies.

Garrett Bullock is a former professional baseball player, physical therapist, and quantitative epidemiologist. He was a Clarendon Scholar at the University of Oxford prior to joining the faculty at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and he also holds honorary appointments with the United Kingdom Centre for Sport, Exercise, and Osteoarthritis Research Versus Arthritis and the Sports Injury Prevention Research Centre, University of Calgary.

Garrett's research focus is in creating real world clinically applicable research that has direct application in orthopaedic and sports medicine. His specific research entails risk and risk mitigation, life span impact of exercise and sport, and the influence of clinical decisions on patient care. Garrett has worked with multiple foundations, federal grants, charities, national and international professional athlete organizations, and leagues through both consulting and academic projects.

Farhana Ferdous is an sssociate professor of architecture at Howard University whose interdisciplinary scholarship examines the relationships among health, aging, environmental design, and the built environment. She earned her PhD from the University of Sydney and completed postdoctoral training at the University of Kansas before joining Howard University. Her research investigates how healthcare facilities, long-term care settings, neighborhoods, housing, and community infrastructure influence health outcomes, well-being, quality of life, and the lived experience of aging across the lifespan. A central focus of her work is to understand how design can support healthy aging, cognitive health, social engagement, and person-centered care for older adults, particularly individuals living with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD). Integrating architecture, public health, and environmental gerontology, she advances evidence-based design strategies that promote health equity, age-friendly communities, dementia-supportive environments, and improved care settings for historically underserved populations. Farhana brings a global perspective to addressing complex challenges at the intersection of architecture, aging, and public health. Her scholarship has been supported by numerous competitive awards, and she is co-editor of Re(Designing) the Continuum of Care for Older Adults (Springer, 2023) and All In: All-Inclusive Engagement in Architecture (Routledge, 2021).

Bilge Firat is the 2026-2027 Fulbright Professor of International Studies with the Diplomatische Akademie Wien/Vienna School of International Studies. Bilge is a US-based Turkish-American political anthropologist and ethnographer (PhD 2011, Binghamton University, State University of New York) and the author of two monographs (Diplomacy and Lobbying during Turkey’s Europeanisation: The Private Life of Politics, Manchester University Press, 2019; Biography of a Pipeline: The Quiet Lives on Southern Gas Corridor forthcoming, Cornell University Press). Situated at the intersections of geopolitics, infrastructure development, and the cultures of expertise, she is broadly interested in questions of access to and accountability in the corridors of power. With her scholarship, and scholarly informed teaching and service, Bilge aims to contribute to the democratization of public debates on topics that are often seen as exclusive competencies of powerful actors. To that end, she actively seeks complex phenomena requiring interdisciplinary research, where she believes her scholarship could make a critical impact. Her research has received support from the Wenner-Gren Foundation, American Council of Learned Societies, and Fulbright US Scholar Program, among others. While at the DA, Bilge will teach two courses and conduct a multi-sited study of geopolitical/geoeconomic expertise incubating in-n-out of Viennese multinational consultancies, international organizations and think-tanks.

Holly Jarman studies the effects of markets and market regulations on health and social policies in areas that include tobacco control, pharmaceutical and medical device regulation, and vaccination. She takes a comparative perspective to political economy, exploring differences between European and North American countries and changes over time.

As a professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, Holly teaches classes on public health policy, research design, and qualitative methods. Much of her work engages with policymakers in various ways. She currently serves as co-lead for policy and dissemination for UM's Center for the Assessment of Tobacco Regulations, where she collaborates with partners in the US Food and Drug Administration and National Institutes of Health to translate and disseminate research findings to broad audiences.

You can find her research in journals that include the Lancet, Milbank Quarterly, Tobacco Control, and the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, and in several books, including The Politics of Trade and Tobacco Control (Palgrave) and Vaccination Politics (University of Michigan Press).

Constance Staley is professor of communication at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs (UCCS), where she recently served as interim dean of the College of Letters, Arts & Sciences and previously as acting dean of the Graduate School. She holds a BS in education, an MA in linguistics, and a PhD in communication.

During a break from academia, Constance worked for a Fortune 500 company, designing and delivering all management and supervisory training programs. She was the first female UCCS faculty member to receive a Fulbright scholar award and has been selected again as a US Fulbright scholar to teach at the University of Salzburg, Austria, during the 2026–2027 academic year.

An award-winning teacher, Constance received the University of Colorado Teaching Award and was nominated for a CASE US Professor of the Year Award. She directed the UCCS First-Year Seminar Program, which grew to 150 sections, for 25 years and is the author of 22 books and editions, including Communicating in Business and the Professions, Teaching College Success, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lectern, the FOCUS on College Success series for Cengage Learning, and Public Speaking: The Inside Story for FlatWorld Learning.

A nationally recognized speaker, Constance delivers webinars and live presentations on communication, artificial intelligence, future of work, teaching and learning, leadership, corporate training, and student success throughout the US and internationally.

Jessica Stewart Kelly is an associate professor of mathematics and associate director of the Center for Effective Teaching at Christopher Newport University (CNU). She earned her bachelor's degee in mathematics from Elon University in 2009 and her PhD in mathematics from Baylor University in 2014, where she studied the spectral analysis of exceptional Laguerre and Jacobi expressions under the advisement of Drs. Constanze Liaw and Lance Littlejohn.

Kelly joined CNU in 2015 after beginning her career at Goucher College. Her teaching and professional interests include undergraduate mathematics education, innovative pedagogy, community-engaged learning, and alternative assessment. She has received Baylor’s Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award and CNU’s Faculty Excellence Award in Teaching.

Kelly’s research focuses on differential equations, with primary interests in exceptional orthogonal polynomials and Lyapunov-type inequalities. Her work in spectral theory examines exceptional Laguerre and Jacobi expressions, while her work on Lyapunov-type inequalities includes eigenvalue estimates for differential and difference equations.

Kelly is currently a US Fulbright scholar and Fulbright-NAWI Graz Visiting Professor in the Natural Sciences at Graz University of Technology in Austria for the 2026–2027 academic year.

Baron Thor Young is an award-winning performer and musician from North Carolina, USA. Baron is currently working as a Fulbright Austria US teaching assistant in tandem with his master’s degree at the Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna (MUK), where he studies with Marcelo Padilla, principal bassoon of the Vienna Radio Symphony. He formerly held the principal bassoon position of the Salisbury Symphony Orchestra in Salisbury, North Carolina, and has appeared as a concerto soloist with the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) Symphony Orchestra. He obtained a bachelor’s in music from UNCSA, where he studied under Dr. Stephanie Patterson. Baron stumbled upon the bassoon as an adolescent and taught himself before attending UNSCA’s high-school program under Saxton Rose. Baron is committed to playing the bassoon outside of just the "bass" part in favor of the "oon" portion. He says, "It's not just a bass. We function better as other voices (i.e., baritone, tenor, alto, and even soprano if we practice hard enough)."

Baron is also an avid unicyclist, recorder player, reed maker, language learner, consumer of all genres of music, and can frequently be found out on a walk.

Michael R. Shaughnessy, PhD, has served as executive director of the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG) since 2020. He has worked to strengthen the pipeline of multilingual learners and language teachers from K–12 through higher education, provide national leadership in federal advocacy efforts, and launched numerous grant and scholarship programs.

Before joining AATG, he spent two decades at Washington & Jefferson College, where he served as professor, chair of modern languages, associate dean, and senior international officer. A scholar of German studies and digital humanities, he directs Echo80.org, a digital initiative that documents memorials to the victims of National Socialism and makes public remembrance accessible, engaging, and relevant for today's audiences.

He holds a PhD in Germanic languages and literatures from the University of Cincinnati and a bachelor's degree from the University of Dayton. He serves on several boards dedicated to language advocacy and to advancing research in language education.

His lifelong passion for languages, literature, and culture grew out of the international education opportunities and scholarships that allowed him to study and work in Austria, Germany, and Russia. Those experiences later led to two Fulbright fellowships in France and Austria. His work is guided by a single conviction: the study of languages and cultures belongs at the core of American education.