As an associate writing professor, Jessica McCaughey ’01 helps undergraduate students process through prose their study abroad experiences to Portugal, Australia, Taiwan, and other countries across the globe.
“I didn’t have a chance to study abroad in college, so I live vicariously through their adventures,” said Jessica, who was a first-generation student while earning a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Mary Washington.
Now, she’s experiencing an overseas opportunity of her own. After receiving a prestigious Fulbright Scholar Award, Jessica moved her family to Northern Ireland in January, where she’ll spend six months teaching creative nonfiction at Queen’s University in Belfast while developing a professional writing archive.
She’s among the dozens of Mary Washington alumni who’ve earned the U.S. government-sponsored grant through the Fulbright Program, one of the world’s most competitive international exchange initiatives. Roughly 30 recipients – including Sofia Taylor ’24, currently conducting psychology research in Germany – and nearly 40 semifinalists have come from UMW, reflecting the University’s growing reputation for Fulbright achievement.
“Jessica is an outstanding example of lifelong learning, and where a Mary Washington degree can lead,” said Professor of Middle Eastern History Nabil Al-Tikriti, who serves as UMW’s Fulbright program co-advisor with Professor and Chair of Biological Sciences Dianne Baker. The University offers information sessions for applicants as well as courses that prepare students for applying for international grants and living and working abroad.
At Mary Washington, English department faculty helped Jessica perfect her own craft and inspired her to pursue writing as a career. She served as a junior copywriter and worked in corporate communications after college but found her way back to academia, earning an MFA in creative writing and a Ph.D. in rhetoric and communications from George Mason University.
She’s taught at The George Washington University (GWU) for over a decade, designing a professional writing program and helping revamp a global bachelor’s degree curriculum. She also co-founded the Archive of Workplace Writing Experiences, an audio collection of interviews with writers from different professions that formed the basis of her project proposal to the Fulbright committee.
“I’m speaking with Belfast writers about what their work looks like post-conflict,” said Jessica, citing the decades-long struggle in Northern Ireland commonly known as The Troubles, which culminated in the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
In her free time, she plans to explore all that Northern Ireland has to offer with her husband, a staff member in the English department at George Mason, and their daughter. “I’ve found everyone here to be warm and welcoming, and it’s such a walkable city,” she said.
And a literary one. Belfast was once home to Nobel laureate Samuel Beckett, The Chronicles of Narnia novelist C.S. Lewis, and a late Irish poet and playwright for whom the Seamus Heaney Centre – where she’s developing the writing archive – was named.
After her stint abroad, Jessica will return to GWU’s University Writing Program, where she teaches in the multidisciplinary first-year program and an upper-level class.
But her favorite is a community-engaged course that partners with a nonprofit founded by one of her former students. The young scholars she teaches now are asked to write, research, and create multimedia projects for Clinic+O, which brings tech-enabled healthcare to rural communities in West Africa.
She credits Mary Washington courses like Literature of Resistance, taught by late Professor Emeritus Taddesse Adera, for helping her better understand global struggles in different parts of the world, including the African diaspora and Northern Ireland.
“Dr. Adera was brilliant, kind, and probably one of the most influential professors I’ve ever had,” said Jessica, recalling how he often came into the bar she worked in during college, where they’d discuss life and literature.
She also appreciates the guidance she received from late Professor Emerita Claudia Emerson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet. Jessica herself has had essays published in prominent publications and is working on a book about writing during career changes.
“All of my professors were so incredibly supportive,” she said. “Mary Washington was really the perfect place for me.”
Learn about applying for UMW Scholarships established by private support, including those to study abroad, as well as external education abroad scholarships through UMW’s Center for International Education.
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