Lea Cejvan

2021 Fulbright U.S. Student Program Grantee

Hometown

Hoffman Estates, IL

Major

Political Science; History Honors

College

College of Liberal Arts

 

Lea Cejvan joined the ranks of more than 400,000 Fulbrighters who have gone abroad to conduct research, study, or teach in one of 165 partner countries since 1946.

On the 75th anniversary of the Fulbright program, Lea is headed to Germany’s Centre of Global Migration Studies at the August-Georg Universität Göttingen. Lea will engage in various academic communities and centers across campus, including the Critical Migration and Border Regime Research Laboratory. Equipped with a minor in German, Lea looks to build upon her knowledge of migration and refugee stigmatization following her defense of an historical honors thesis in April 2021.

Although Lea grew up speaking Croatian at home in Chicago, she points to an insightful moment on a trip to her mother’s childhood home in Bosnia, when she suddenly noticed how her understanding of home stood in contrast to that of her immediate family. While Lea intends to gain valuable experience interviewing what is a sizable Balkan population in the state of Lower Saxony, Germany, she is clearly on a path toward a career in foreign policy.