Jesse Paul, recipient of the Freeman-ASIA Award
The Berea College Center for International Education (CIE) announced that Berea College student Jesse Paul has received the prestigious Freeman-ASIA Award for education abroad purposes during the fall 2018 semester. Paul, a junior Asian Studies major from Boone, Kentucky, plans to study in China.
Freeman Awards for Study in Asia (Freeman-ASIA) provides scholarships for U.S. undergraduate students. The program strives to increase the number of U.S. citizens and permanent residents with first-hand exposure to and understanding of Asia and its people and cultures. Freeman scholars receive up to $7,000 each to apply towards the cost of the study-abroad program and related expenses, including airfare, basic living costs, local transportation and books.
Award recipients are required to share their experiences with their home campuses or communities to encourage study abroad by others and fulfill the program’s goal of increasing understanding of Asia in the United States.
Freeman-ASIA is sponsored by the Freeman Foundation, a private foundation with offices in Honolulu, Hawaii. The Freeman Foundation’s major objectives include strengthening the bonds of friendship between the United States and countries of East Asia. Through education and educational institutes, the Foundation hopes to develop a greater appreciation of Asian cultures, histories and economies in the United States and a better understanding of the American people and of American institutions and purposes by the people of East Asia.
Freeman-ASIA has supported more than 4,500 U.S. undergraduates from more than 600 institutions with their study-abroad plans in East and Southeast Asia. Berea’s most recent previous Freeman-ASIA recipients are Katheryn Thompson and Brandon W. Pollock, both of whom studied in China.