VCU alumnus on Fulbright grant in Ukraine studies ancestry to inform his novel
by Lauren McClellan
Some people dream of visiting the country where their ancestors lived. For Joel Kabot, his dream became a reality when he received a Fulbright research grant to study in Ukraine.
Kabot started working on a novel while he was enrolled in Virginia Commonwealth University’s M.F.A. program in creative writing. His novel has many settings, including the Deep South, Washington, D.C. and upstate New York. For the final setting, Kabot thought it was necessary to travel to western Ukraine, western Ukraine, the birthplace of his (and his protagonist’s) Polish and Ukrainian great-grandparents.
Ukraine
During his time in Ukraine, Kabot has had a wide range of experiences including getting lost in a small village. There to visit an old castle, a snowstorm caused him to become lost while on his way back to the bus stop. During a portion of his time as a Fulbright Student Scholar, he traveled across Ukraine. On one of those trips, he stumbled upon an end-of-winter festival in a city in eastern Ukraine close to the Russian border.
One of Kabot’s most notable experiences while in Ukraine was acting in a short Ukrainian art film.
“I played a law firm employee (not quite a lawyer), and appear for less than a minute in a 10-minute film, but my scenes required an entire day of filming,” Kabot said. “For someone who had never acted in any way before, it was a lot of work, but definitely a fun experience. I never thought I’d be in a film, no matter how brief. So basically, look out, Hollywood.”
All of these experiences and more have helped to give Kabot a more realistic view of Ukraine. Before he arrived in Lviv, Ukraine for his Fulbright studies, he had a preconception of the place. He had only been there once before and had studied its history before his Fulbright studies began. Because of that, he thought of Lviv in terms of history and politics, making him think of it as “this homogenous, ultra-Ukrainian city.”
“Lviv is that, in some respects, but while the past is certainly remembered here in Lviv, it is less politicized than I thought it would be,” Kabot said. “There are certainly reminders and remnants of the past all around—and some of it is politicized—but to a lesser degree than I expected in people’s day to day lives.”
Kabot’s extended stay in Lviv has been very important to him. He believes that he has learned a lot more about Ukraine by living as a local as opposed to staying for a short time.
“Even the difficult experiences—finding an apartment, obtaining my residency registration, living through a long winter – I am glad to have gone through,” Kabot said. “It’s amazing to think that I can say, now, that I’ve lived in Lviv—not just visited. It may sound simple, but it means quite a lot to me.”
The application process
The summer before Kabot began graduate school at Virginia Commonwealth University, he visited Ukraine with his best friend. While travelling, Kabot had the chance to visit the land where his ancestors lived. He felt drawn to the place and knew he had to go back somehow. This pull towards Ukraine was evident in his personal statement.
“In my personal statement, I mentioned how that short experience in Ukraine wasn’t enough, and that I knew I needed to return,” Kabot said. “I like to think that was pretty convincing!”
Kabot first heard about the National Scholarship Office through email. He attended two Fulbright information sessions offered by the National Scholarship Office to get more information about the application process.
“The NSO does a great job getting the word out about information sessions, I have to say,” Kabot said. “They hold a lot of them, too, especially where Fulbright is concerned, so there’s no excuse not to attend if you have even the slightest interest in a Fulbright.”
The spring before the fall application deadline, Kabot started seriously thinking about applying for a Fulbright. He began researching his chosen country during the summer to make himself a competitive candidate.
“A lot of the application process was spent figuring out how to adequately express why I wanted to go to Ukraine—why I had to go to Ukraine,” Kabot said.
In order to complete his application, Kabot consulted professors, friends, fellow students and the staff at the National Scholarship Office. While his personal statement came to him with ease, his statement of grant purpose required multiple revisions.
“I had to completely rewrite my statement of grant purpose at least once—I especially remember one agonizing weekend in September where I spent almost all my waking hours on that essay. And I’m not counting all the smaller edits that I had to make throughout the early fall—there were many, many of those,” Kabot said. “I was lucky that writing my personal statement was not a difficult process for me, although that was certainly balanced out by my experience writing the statement of grant purpose.”
In addition to his research of Ukraine, Kabot also found the Russian classes he took while at VCU helped flesh out his application.
“I know it’s unusual for an M.F.A. student to take undergraduate foreign language classes, but having the opportunity to study a Slavic language in a classroom environment was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up,” Kabot said. “As a side note, I’d encourage all M.F.A. students—and other graduate students—to do the same thing. Why not?”
To Kabot, the National Scholarship Office’s Fulbright timeline packet was the most helpful tool he had during the application process.
“If I had to pick just one thing, the timeline of suggested deadlines they provided was probably the most beneficial,” Kabot said. “The people at the NSO know their stuff, and they know that putting together a competitive, successful Fulbright application requires an early commitment. It’s a process that can take six months or more.”
Kabot said he also found the Fulbright review panels “invaluable.” He was especially grateful for the services the National Scholarship Office here at VCU provide because many schools do not have an office dedicated to helping their students and alumni apply for nationally competitive scholarships. While at a conference last year, he met a woman who had just returned from her Fulbright journey. While she was applying for the Fulbright, she visited the Fulbright website to get more information on how to apply.
“The Fulbright website had a listing for her campus contact, but when she went to visit this person, he said something along the lines of ‘Fulbright? Yeah, I think I’ve heard of that.’ And this was not some small college—institutionally speaking, it compared to VCU in terms of size and mission,” Kabot said. “My point is that not every place has an entity like NSO. I’m incredibly grateful that VCU does have an organization like it, and I urge VCU students to take advantage of the support they offer.”
After submitting his application, Kabot knew the process he went through with the National Scholarship Office’s assistance would be beneficial whether or not he actually received his Fulbright.
“I approached Fulbright with the attitude that, even if I failed to get the grant, all the time spent preparing and applying would not have been in vain, because at least I would come away with increased knowledge of a place that was very important to me,” Kabot said. “And of course, all that time thinking about western Ukraine and how it fit into my novel was highly beneficial. So I knew applying for a Fulbright was worthwhile, no matter the outcome.”
Kabot received his Fulbright and the opportunity to travel to a country he felt drawn to because of his ancestry. When describing the moment he learned he received his Fulbright, Kabot said, “I felt pure elation. I was confident about my chances, knowing I had done everything I could, put my best foot forward, so to speak, but of course you can’t be sure of anything. To get that email saying that I had been selected for a Fulbright—well, it was an amazing moment, truly.”
Now, he feels pure gratitude and pride about his Fulbright experience:
“I’d like to say that I deeply appreciate my Fulbright grant. I know that I couldn’t have obtained one without the help of the National Scholarship Office or my professors at VCU, who provided letters of recommendation, advice, and support,” Kabot said. “Really, my whole experience as an M.F.A. student at VCU allowed me to be a competitive candidate—without my time growing as a writer, and without being able to indulge in other interests like my Russian language study, I would not be a Fulbright fellow today. There are a tremendous amount of opportunities open to students at VCU, regardless of what they study. I’m grateful and proud to be an alumnus, representing VCU here in western Ukraine.”
Advice for future scholarship applicants
“It’s important to remember that the application process for a lot of different grants, such as the Fulbright, takes months of preparation and work. It’s easy to look at deadlines and think, yeah, I can do these essays in a week or two. I admit, I might have thought that way without the help of the National Scholarship Office. At the very first Fulbright information session that I attended (the spring before I applied), they handed out a suggested timeframe for completing Fulbright-related tasks—by this date, you should have contacted recommenders, or obtained affiliation (with a host university in your selected country), etc. At first, the suggested dates seemed incredibly early and conservative, given that the final deadline for Fulbright wasn’t for another six or seven months. But I found that by following those suggested dates, I was able to make progress incrementally, so that I had a polished, complete application in advance of the ultimate deadline. That suggested timeline was perhaps the most important document in my entire application process. Without it, who knows how my application would’ve turned out.”
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VCU alumni or current students interested in applying for a Fulbright Scholarship or other nationally competitive scholarships should contact the National Scholarship Office at honorsnso@vcu.edu or (804) 828-6868.
Categories Fulbright Award, NSO Student Features, Other Scholarship Opportunities