During my junior year of high school, a teacher named Sarah Daneker pulled me aside and said she thought I could win a scholarship to study in Germany. Mrs. Daneker--we called her “Frau,” German for “Mrs.”--was the foreign language department head. She thought she saw something in me, so I allowed myself to believe it could happen. She was right. Because of Frau, I spent my senior year of high school as an exchange student about 15 miles outside of Hamburg.
I learned the language, went hiking in the Alps, and saw the length and breadth of the country--all before I was 18. Being so far from home for that long gave me a chance to view myself and everything I thought I knew in a different light. I returned home more capable, I think; freer for having seen that there are many different ways to conduct politics, be part of a family, and relate to other people; and astonished by German engineering. There were literally Mercedes garbage trucks. They were beautiful.
I have some sense of how that kind of exposure can alter the course of a young life, so I’d like to help provide a similar experience to someone else.
The winner of this school year’s Baldwin Prize will choose from two options for the award: a $2,500 educational grant or a summer study-abroad program worth up to $6,000. A winner who would like to travel will be given the means to do so, but if he or she for whatever reason would rather stay closer to home, the educational grant is available.
The Baldwin Prize is named after James Baldwin, who moved to Paris at age 24 then remained in France for most of the rest of his life. “'Once I found myself on the other side of the ocean,” he said, “I could see where I came from very clearly.” Few people ever saw America with greater acuity.
I would love for this year’s winner to travel to Paris and see some of what Baldwin saw, but the destination, France or elsewhere, will be his or her choice, and the study trip will be arranged through an experienced organization like the Council on International Educational Exchange or Youth for Understanding, which administered the program that sent me to Germany.
The Baldwin Prize is able to offer this opportunity because of the generosity of many individual donors. If you would like to support this effort, please donate here.
Travel often leads to adventure and adventure to great stories. I look forward to the many great stories that this year's Prize will produce.
-- Lionel Foster
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