News from The Mahurin Honors College

Lilian Branch (she/her/hers) from Chattanooga, TN, is spending her summer of 2024 at the National University of Tainan in Taiwan, thanks to the Critical Language Scholarship (CLS). This fully funded overseas language and cultural immersion program supports American undergraduates and graduates in studying critical languages and building relationships between the United States and other countries. For Lilian, this experience will advance her academic pursuits in her dual majors of Chinese and Molecular Biotechnology.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Lilian towards the end of the spring ’24 semester about her CLS award and her unfolding journey at Western Kentucky University (WKU), where she was completing her second semester as a member of the  Chinese Flagship Program and the Mahurin Honors College. A fascinating part of our conversation was learning how she chose WKU—a decision she describes as a “random chance.” Inspired by a presentation at her school by Ole Miss about their Flagship program, she explored other universities with similar offerings, ultimately leading her to WKU.

Lilian's dedication to studying Chinese seriously influenced her decision. Other programs offered Chinese as a major but did not meet her concerns about “attaining proficiency and gaining the necessary experience” to be competitive in professional fields. WKU’s comprehensive Chinese Flagship Program stood out for its combination of language and cultural education, ensuring graduates are proficient in all aspects and can interact effectively with people in their host nation.

Excelling in the Chinese Flagship Program and her major, Lilian's first-year success is also attributed to her head start—she earned an associate degree through Collegiate High School in partnership with Chattanooga State Community College, allowing her to take 12-13 credit hours each semester at WKU. Her dual enrollment sparked an interest in Biology, particularly microbiology, thanks to an inspiring professor, explaining that “the professor I had was so amazing and so sweet and I kinda fell in love with molecular, microscopic, biology.”

While she hopes to be able to participate in laboratory work at her host university in Taiwan during her 8-week experience, Lilian is also trying to get into a WKU lab to do research in her sophomore year – “that’s one thing I like about WKU is that it’s easier to get into labs versus bigger universities where it’s more competitive.” The lab she really wants to join is focused on “yeast cells and cell shapes and how studying that can help us because it’s similar to our cells.” Lilian plans to parlay her laboratory work into an honors thesis in due time to satisfy her honors requirements.

The CLS award was not something that she knew about, but “OSD hosted a workshop and that’s what piqued my interest in CLS as a first-year student. OSD says so many motivating things and I want to apply for all of the scholarships because “a scholarship is an unopened door” and that’s a good way of putting it and wanting to get the experience [of applying].”

Lilian worked closely with Dr. Melinda Grimsley of Office of Scholar Development (OSD) to complete her application and associated essays. The essays require the applicant to describe their scholar experience in their current academic year, how they would respond to situational scenarios while abroad, how they plan to manage the intensity of the exchange experience, and their overall Chinese fluency. She was a determined applicant, and while Lilian was “so excited for Halloween that fall ’23 term, I ended up going home to focus on these five essays, and then two-or-three revisions with Dr. Grimsley, and then [I] submitted in November.”

She was notified of her semi-finalist status in early January 2024. Lilian recalled being “so nervous, I remember getting semi-finalist and not really wanting to tell anyone, and my parents were so proud for being a semi-finalist, but I really wanted to get finalist.” She was named a finalist in March 2024, alongside another WKU student, Samuel Engel. “Winning the award meant a lot to me because I shared a lot of personal details in my application, so this showed me that the hard work I did in my high school years and up until now, it’s an indicator that my hard work is paying off.”

Over the course of our conversation, Lilian shared more about the actual experience that awaited her in Taiwan. “We have language partners at the destination university, we have class 5 days a week, and classes are 9-3, and we have the weekends to ourselves.” She was also reading the official handbook for the program developed by the State Department to gain a better understanding of what awaited her, explaining that “CLS is funded by the State Department and the handbook was like 91 pages and it covers so many topics, one of the topics that it covers was like how to use the toilet in the ground, and I thought that was great because you’re not going to leave with questions.”

Upon her return to WKU for the 2024-2025 academic year, Lilian plans to continue unpacking her professional aspirations, and she hopes that the CLS experience will provide clarity. “I initially thought about medical school and realizing the requirements of CFP and after volunteering and shadowing with a couple of doctors, I realized that I don’t know if I’d like that route. Research is something I’m interested in pursuing, I was interested in pathology, which does require medical school, but there’s also PHD/MD, and if I continue doing Chinese and work in government, then I’d like to have financial support.”

All the while, she plans to continue improving her Chinese language speaking abilities by sharing an apartment with a friend from the CFP program with the strict promise “to only speak Chinese… we are creating our own immersion house.” Due to the intensity of the CFP program, Lilian’s involvement in MHC community has been more passive, but she has attended a few social events hosted by Honors Social Planning Board, she’s also a member of the Asian-American Association and participates in the microbiology club.

For students considering their own pursuit of a nationally competitive scholarship, Lilian stated that, “I would encourage younger students in CFP to apply for this scholarship because even if you don’t get it the first time you’ve learned a lot, and you can try again. There’s so many resources out there and people are willing to share information, but if you’re not really looking for them they could be right in your face, and you just never, ever, see them or take advantage of them.”

For any student interested in learning more about Lilian’s experience, she’s more than happy to speak with students about her experience and hopes that others may come to realize that their dreams are possible.