By Ian Wesselhoff 

T wo seniors at Georgia College & State University, J.D. Caulley and Paola Martinez, were named finalists for the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. Both students were awarded the English Teaching Assistantship, which provides grants to send them abroad to teach English. 

Caulley, an English major, will be spending the upcoming school year teaching college-level English in Antwerp, Belgium. Martinez, Spanish and elementary education double major, is going to teach elementary students in La Rioja, Spain. Both will be overseas starting in September until June 2027. 

“It was just this moment where everything I had worked so hard for came to fruition, and it was just so beautiful,” Caulley said. “Any of my friends will tell you I haven’t shut up about this program for the past year. It’s been a constant topic in my mind.” 

Fulbright received over 10,500 applications this year, and six Georgia College students were selected as semifinalists – the highest for the university since before the COVID-19 pandemic.  

Caulley’s mother, a teacher herself, grew up in France, and he has visited family there multiple times. After taking a trip to Belgium on one of those visits last summer, Caulley knew he wanted to come back one day. 

“I fell in love with it instantly,” he said. 

Caulley already has plenty of experience in a classroom setting. For his capstone course, “Teaching Writing in Schools,” he taught creative writing to sixth graders in a weekly class. His French minor led Caulley to a service-learning course where he would visit two local elementary schools with bilingual lesson plans and read stories in French.

Like Caulley, Martinez will not be visiting her respective country for the first time during her Fulbright journey. Two years ago, she secured an internship through Georgia College and taught English in Seville for a summer.  

“And this, I just take it as the same thing – as another opportunity to expand my horizons and see what I’m capable of doing,” Martinez said. 

Martinez was raised in Mexico and moved to the U.S. when she was 14. She spent the past year as an intern teaching in an ESOL classroom, and for her, pursuing bilingual education is a way to “pay it forward.”  

“I went through a really difficult childhood … I didn’t have a safe place. Home didn’t feel safe. I was just not safe anywhere but in school,” Martinez said. “I was very lucky to get teachers that were super supportive and that helped me. They never let me give up on myself … I want to make school a safe place for more kids.” 

To become finalists, the students’ applications went through the National Screening Committee, made up of university faculty members from across the U.S., and were forwarded to their selected host countries for a final decision. 

“It’s a big, exciting thing that I think says really good things about Georgia College and where our students are headed,” said Anna Whiteside, assistant director of the GCSU and coordinator of the National Scholarships Office. “Host countries see these [Fulbright students] as being the best and the brightest young Americans, and they really want to form good relationships with them.”

Header Images: Paola Martinez presents a research poster on climate change. J.D. Caulley (far right) presents with classmates during the World Languages Showcase this spring. (Photos: Anna Gay Leavitt)