Gustav Grimm

Austrian Fulbright foreign language teaching assistant
The Ohio State University
Social sciences
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The program did not only have a positive impact on my own professional development; it also enabled me to inspire people in the US, whom I would have never met without being awarded the Fulbright scholarship.

Each Fulbright experience is unique because it is shaped by a multitude of factors. The academic host institution, its location, and the people working there all have a big impact on how FLTAs experience life in the US. For two semesters, I was able to teach and study at The Ohio State University (OSU)—one of the largest public universities in the US—located in Columbus, Ohio. If I had to pick one word to describe my time at OSU, it would be community. Let me tell you why.

I arrived in Columbus in late July 2022 and had a couple of days to settle in and explore the environment before my teacher training started, preparing me for my role as a German instructor. The workshop was a rather strenuous undertaking, but also a great opportunity to meet my new colleagues as well as instructors from other language departments. After two weeks of training, I was ready to teach, and I had become friends with people teaching a variety of languages such as Spanish and Japanese.

But not only did I feel a certain kind of affiliation with the other instructors, I also quickly felt at home in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures (GLL). The staff and faculty were outstandingly kind and supportive and showed genuine interest in each individual student. Most of the courses I took were relatively small and relied heavily on input from the students, while being guided by distinguished experts in the field. This was a new experience for me, and it had a great impact on my perception of academic life in the US.

It would be impossible to give this account centering on the community of my host institution without mentioning the graduate and doctoral students at GLL. For two semesters, these people were my colleagues and friends, sharing my hardships and my successes, and I cannot thank them enough. Without them, my experience wouldn’t have been nearly as rewarding as it was. Many of them graduated this year and will be pursuing new opportunities in other parts of the US or Europe, but we all carry a little bit of OSU in us, and our shared experiences will remain a strong transnational tie.

Photo of Gustav and his colleagues at OSUGustav and his colleagues at OSU

Last but not least, I want to talk about my work as an FLTA. Being placed in a new environment that was inclusive and competitive at the same time, I was motivated to give my best when it came to teaching language courses. The vast majority of my students had never met a person from Austria before, so I tried to include tidbits of Austrian culture whenever I could. I taught two different groups of students (one per semester), and I can proudly say that I managed to create a sense of community within each class.

Photo of Gustav's students in the fall semesterGustav's students in the fall semester

I was especially happy to see that two of my first-semester students went to Dresden and Vienna as part of two different summer courses offered by OSU. Moreover, one of my second-semester students wrote me a letter in which she told me that I had motivated her to continue learning German. Because of this, I know that the program did not only have a positive impact on my own professional development; it also enabled me to inspire people in the US, whom I would have never met without being awarded the Fulbright scholarship.

It was an eventful and formative year for me, and I am by no means exaggerating when I say that I will remember it forever. Columbus and the people at OSU have a special place in my heart, and I would recommend studying there to anyone.

Gustav Grimm was an FLTA at The Ohio State University during the 2022–23 program year.

Photos courtesy of Gustav