We are very pleased to announce that seven UC Berkeley students have been awarded the U.S. Government’s Critical Language Scholarship (CLS), a fully-funded 8–10-week overseas language and cultural immersion program for American undergraduate and graduate students at every level of language learning. The next application deadline will be in November 2025 (for summer 2026 programs). Students in any year of college are eligible to apply!
Please join us in congratulating the following students:
Alexandra “Sasha” Bergseid (’29, EECS) will be spending the summer in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, continuing her study of Russian. As a heritage speaker, Sasha hopes to use her language skills to pursue engineering abroad in the future. Read more about Sasha here (opens web page).
Giselle Carreño (‘25, Business Administration/Spanish & Portuguese) will be traveling to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil this summer to further her Portuguese knowledge and explore Brazilian business practices. She plans to use her skills in Spanish and Portuguese in her international business career and her community. Read more about Giselle here (opens web page).
Utkarsh Dubey (‘27, Political Science/History) will spend the summer in Lucknow, India furthering his knowledge of Urdu. Utkarsh plans to use the linguistic skills gained from CLS to help create spaces of transparency and cooperation between South Asian and United States governments, working at the intersection of law and foreign policy. Read more about Utkarsh here (opens web page).
Abigail Klein (’26, Russian Language & Culture/Psychology) is headed to Daugavpils, Latvia to study Russian this summer. Abigail is an editor of Troika, UC Berkeley’s undergraduate Slavic journal. In the future, she hopes to advance disability inclusion and accessibility on an international scale, using language and cultural understanding to drive meaningful change. Read more about Abigail here (opens web page).
Tiffany Mar (’25, Society & Environment) will be a part of the CLS 2025 cohort studying Bahasa Indonesia. She is interested in exploring how community-driven solutions can solve pressing sustainability challenges. In the future, Tiffany would like to use her Indonesian skills to pursue a career in geospatial research where she can advocate for both people and the planet. Read more about Tiffany here (opens web page).
Khephra Owl (’25, Educational Sciences) will be traveling to Okayama, Japan to study Japanese. Khephra spent two years tutoring Japanese in community college and became interested in improving Japanese learning materials to better address the needs of adult learners. In the future, she hopes to write a new Japanese textbook and pursue a career in which she can continue advocating for multilingual education in the United States. Read more about Khephra here (opens web page).
Arya Vishin (‘25, English/South Asian Studies) will spend this summer studying Hindi in Jaipur, India. Last year, he studied Kashmiri in Gurgaon through the AIIS, and is excited to return to India for another summer of language learning. In the fall, he will utilize this training as he starts his PhD in Harvard’s department of Comparative Literature. Read more about Arya here (opens web page).