Boren Scholars and Fellows Program (NSEP)
This program, also known as the National Security Education Program (NSEP) enables U.S. graduate or undergraduate students to pursue overseas specialization in area and language study and was created by then Senator David L. Boren in 1991. Specifically, Boren Scholarships (for undergraduate students) and Fellowships (for graduate students) provide financial support to study languages, cultures, and world regions that are deemed critical to U.S. national security but are less frequently studied by U.S. students. Areas of the world that are never eligible for the NSEP are Western Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand and languages such as Spanish, French, German, etc.
While language focus is always changing, examples of recently awarded language programs have been in Chinese, Arabic and Turkish. All participating students must be concurrently participating in an academic program at the time of participation as an NSEP scholar. Limited to U.S. citizens, this program has a federal government service agreement attached to the award and would require work by the recipient at an approved federal position after completion.
For further information about this program and an exhaustive list of focused languages and service sites, please go to this website:
www.borenawards.org
Also, please feel free to contact the OU campus representative for NSEP: Jack Hobson
jhobson@ou.edu