Dr. Samuel Echevarria-Cruz, chair of Austin Community College’s Department of Sociology and Social Work, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to teach and perform research in Romania.
Echevarria-Cruz will spend nine months teaching sociology, demography, and health at Babes-Bolyai University, Romania’s largest public university. He also will participate in research examining the health and socioeconomic inequalities experienced by the Roma people, one of Europe’s largest minority groups.
Echevarria-Cruz, who holds a doctorate in Sociology from the University of Texas at Austin, has taught at ACC since 2005. He has had a number of administrative roles at the college and has served as faculty senate president.
“Early in my career I fell in love with both college teaching and the community college environment,” he says. “One of my goals as a Fulbright Scholar is to discuss the power of U.S. community colleges, and use ACC as an example of an excellent institution that is educating an entire community to empower change and increase opportunities to succeed in life.”
Echevarria-Cruz begins his Fulbright Scholar assignment in October. It will be his fourth time teaching in Romania: During the past year he has spent semester breaks teaching research methods at Emanuel University of Oradea.
Echevarria-Cruz is the second ACC faculty member in the past five years to receive a Fulbright award. The U.S. Department of State sponsors the Fulbright Scholar Program, which supports research and teaching that promotes a mutual understanding and respect between people of the United States and other countries.
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