Dan Baird, a junior accounting major from Garden Grove, California, recently won a prestigious one-year National Security Educational Program (NSEP) Boren Scholarship that will enable him to study at the University of Bacau in northeastern Romania. He is believed to be the first BYU-Hawaii student to win this scholarship and the first American to study at the University of Bacau.
Baird, a research assistant for Dr. Brian Houghton in terrorism in the tourism industry studies, has also secured an internship this summer with the U.S. Department of State in Bucharest, the capital of Romania.
NSEP Boren Scholarships are designed to provide support for U.S. undergraduates "to pursue the study of languages and cultures currently underrepresented in study abroad and critical to U.S. national security." The award later requires recipients to use their language and regional expertise by working as an employee for at least one year in the U.S. Department of Defense, State, Homeland Security, or the intelligence community.
Baird, who transferred to BYU-Hawaii in 2004 after earning an associate’s degree in business from Golden West College in Huntington Beach, California, explained he became aware of the NSEP award last fall from his father, a dean at Golden West. He applied to go to Romania because his fiancée at the time, and now his wife, Iuliana Grigoras Baird — a Social Work major who just graduated in April, is from there. There are also currently two other Romanian students at BYU-Hawaii.
"As I looked at it from a career perspective, Romania is well poised: It’s a young democracy liberated from Communism in 1991. It just entered the EU [European Union] last year, is a recent NATO member, and it’s also one of the eastern-most European countries. It borders on the Black Sea, across from Turkey, so it’s almost a gateway to the east. There are a lot of interesting dynamics going on there right now, so this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."
"We’re excited to go to Romania so my wife can begin to fulfill her desire to return home and serve there, to apply the things she’s had an opportunity to learn while here. I’ll also be meeting my in-laws for the first time," he said.
Baird explained the University of Bacau offers a preparatory year of intensive Romanian language study. "I don’t have previous experience in Romanian, although my wife has been tutoring me. Romanian is a Latin-based language, however, and I served a Spanish-speaking mission in Colorado Springs, Colorado, so I hope that shortens the learning curve. I think it sounds similar to Italian, and there’s a large cross-over of Romanians heading to Italy for work: They pick up the language within a month or two, so there are a lot of similarities."
Baird noted the NSEP Boren award application process took about six months. "The process required putting together a proposal, which includes finding a place to go to school and getting accepted by the program; then submitting essays, budgets and a multitude of other paper work that they’re interested in."
In reference to the service requirement of the award, Baird said he concurrently applied for — and received — the State Department internship in Bucharest. "I’m very excited to also have that opportunity."
After his year in Romania, Baird said he plans to return to BYU-Hawaii to graduate. "It’s been an interesting process working with the different administrative departments, getting everything prepared so I can take leave for a year and still maintain my student status here, because there hasn’t been a precedent for an award like this at BYU-Hawaii previously. A Fulbright or Rhodes might be a comparative scholarship."
"I’m currently working with the different departments, my advisors and mentors to put together a policy for such awards in the future so more students can be allowed opportunities like this," he added. "I think half of your education is in the classroom, and the other half is your experiences and the different connections you can make," Baird said. "To be successful, you need to develop and foster both."
"The more opportunities BYU-Hawaii students can have to do things like this furthers the mission of the school to create ambassadors for peace internationally," Baird added, "really helps make a name for the school and provides invaluable experiences for those who get to go. I’ve had a lot of help getting to this point."
One of those who helped him, Dr. W. Clayton Hubner, Dean of the BYU-Hawaii School of Business, said, "We’re extremely pleased that, through his own extensive efforts, Dan Baird has been able to secure an excellent internship with the U.S. State Department and an NSEP award to facilitate his studies in Romania. We hope his experience inspires other students to expand their sights beyond current practice and pursue excellence in creative ways."
And another, Dr. Brian Houghton, Baird’s supervisor, added, "I don’t know if anyone here has won an award quite like Dan’s. It’s one of the elite scholarships that a university student can get. Those who have won it in the past have come from top-line universities, so Dan represents not only the best of our university but also the best of college students in the entire United States. It shows credit on him and BYU-Hawaii."
