{"id":348185,"date":"2021-07-19T06:00:11","date_gmt":"2021-07-18T20:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=348185"},"modified":"2021-07-19T06:00:11","modified_gmt":"2021-07-18T20:00:11","slug":"state-department-awards-critical-language-scholarship-to-2-at-uog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/state-department-awards-critical-language-scholarship-to-2-at-uog\/","title":{"rendered":"State Department awards Critical  Language Scholarship to 2 at UOG"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_348190\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-348190\" style=\"width: 240px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Monita-Pau-mug.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-348190\" src=\"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Monita-Pau-mug-240x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"240\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-348190\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Monita Paul<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Two University of Guam students\u2014including one who is from Saipan\u2014have been awarded scholarships through a federal program designed to further their study of foreign languages critical to national security and economic prosperity.<\/p>\n<p>From a nationwide pool of over 4,600 applicants, UOG students Monita Paul and Lourdes Mafnas were selected for the U.S. Department of State\u2019s\u00a0Critical Language Scholarship. The scholarship program supports the study of 15 critical languages and provides fully funded, group-based intensive language instruction and cultural enrichment experiences. Students typically spend eight to 10 weeks studying abroad, although most of this year\u2019s CLS institutes will be offered as a virtual program due to the ongoing pandemic.<\/p>\n<p>Paul, a Saipan resident and a Saipan Southern High School alumna, enrolled in the program because of her desire to communicate with family members. She is studying the Bangla language remotely this summer through the American Institute of Indian Studies in Kolkata, India.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am of Bengali heritage, specifically from my father\u2019s side of the family, but I am unable to read, write, or even speak the language fluently,\u201d said Paul, who is a Biology major at UOG. \u201cI am looking forward to coming out from the program with the ability to communicate with my father\u2019s side of the family. I\u2019m also hoping to use the experience and knowledge I gain for my future career in the medical field.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mafnas, an environmental science graduate student, said she applied for the program because it looked like an amazing opportunity to explore another culture and visit another country. Regardless of not being able to study abroad this year, Mafnas wanted to continue with the program because she believed it could open doors to other careers and opportunities.<\/p>\n<p>She is studying the Indonesian language remotely through the Universitas Negri Malang in Malang, Indonesia, one of the program\u2019s partner institutes. Mafnas said she chose the language because of her interest in Indonesia\u2019s culture, history, people, and environment.\u00a0(UOG)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two University of Guam students\u2014including one who is from Saipan\u2014have been awarded scholarships through a&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":348191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[3237,445],"class_list":["post-348185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-state-department","tag-uog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=348185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/348191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=348185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=348185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=348185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}