Tenney Earns Fulbright

Quite proud of Atkinson Scholarship recipient and recent Wheaton College graduate Savannah Tenney who recently received the prestigious Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship!

She will use the award to travel to the Taiwanese archipelago of Kinmen, located just off the coast of mainland China, for an 11-month teaching post starting in August.

While at Wheaton, Tenney double majored in anthropology and English and spent time in Scotland and Tanzania. For this next adventure, she wanted to experience Asia.

“I have never really studied Asia in school, and I felt I had a whole lot to learn from traveling somewhere completely different,” she said. “I chose Taiwan specifically because they have a fascinating and complicated cultural and historical identity. I also felt that their relationship to the English language as one of three main languages would make for an interesting teaching experience.”

Tenney, who’s Atkinson Scholarship application essay focused on her work with the nonprofit Facing Cancer Together, a Newton-based cancer support center, has sustained the Atkinson spirit of giving back to the community. She has continued her involvement with FCT and based her senior thesis on the “illness narratives” of women with ovarian cancer she met while volunteering.

After completing her year in Taiwan, Tenney envisions participating in Teach for America or Americorps and studying applied anthropology or public health in graduate school.

About the Fulbright, she told us: “I do not believe I would have received this incredible opportunity without attending Wheaton and without the generosity of the Sudbury Foundation which allowed me to attend Wheaton.”

We wish her all the best!