Nineteen University of Wisconsin students will realize their dreams of studying abroad after receiving Fulbright scholarships, UW officials announced Monday.

Erin Crawley, a UW Fulbright Program advisor, said the Fulbright Program awards two types of scholarships and for the 2010-2011 award year, 19 students in total received awards.

One of those recipients, UW graduate student Melissa Anderson, said in an email to The Badger Herald she would study colonial policing in France and post-colonial policing in Vietnam thanks to the scholarship.

Without the scholarship, Anderson would not have been able to visit archives in France and Vietnam that house documents essential to her research, she said.

While some of this year’s recipients are already abroad, Anderson said her program does not start until December and lasts a full 12 months.

The recipient of a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad award, Anderson learned about the scholarship opportunity through other graduate students and said she is excited about her upcoming adventure.

Similarly, UW graduate student Katie Jarvis said in an email to The Badger Herald her dissertation would not be possible without studying in France as she, like Anderson, also needs access to archives abroad.

Jarvis’ research focuses on the political activism and cultural representation of a group of market women in Paris during the French Revolution.

Unlike Anderson, Jarvis is already in France and said she spends as much time during the week as she can at the archives.

“Last weekend, all over Europe, each country hosted a Heritage Day during which most places of national importance open their doors freely to the general public,” she said. “It was amazing to be flanked by the nation’s records.”

Jarvis received a U.S. Student Program award and is spending 10 months in France, ultimately heading back to the U.S. in June.

The most well-known of the awards is the U.S. Student Program, which Crawley said funds a wide variety of things for students from research grants to courses of study to teaching assistantships.

The benefit of the U.S. Student Program is its flexibility, Crawley said. Recipients can be undergraduates about to receive their bachelor’s degrees, graduate students or simply people who want to conduct a research project when they apply.

Students get to choose the country they wish to study in, but must have compelling reasons for doing so, and must have someone to guide their projects, Crawley said.

For the U.S. Student Program, students typically study abroad for a full academic year.

Unlike the U.S. Student Program, Crawley said the Fulbright-Hayes DDRA is only for dissertators who want to study in non-western countries.

The program has more flexibility than the U.S. Student Program in terms of length, with programs lasting from six months to a full year.

Crawley said the application process starts a year before students hope to go abroad and the Fulbright Programs received 5,489 applications for the 2010-2011 award year. Only 954 grants were awarded.

The number of UW students who receive Fulbright awards varies from year to year, Crawley said, but UW has consistently been in the top ten for the number of awards given.