Abigail Martuscello is a Gilman Scholarship Recipient.

My name is Abigail Martuscello and I am a Junior at the College of Charleston studying Political Science / Jewish Studies / Middle Eastern Studies. This semester I will be studying abroad through USAC at the University of Haifa in Israel.

With a lifelong goal of becoming fluent in another language, I always knew that the location of where I chose to study abroad in college would correlate to the language I was studying to earn liberal arts credit. On a whim, I decided to pursue my dream of learning Hebrew, simultaneously got exposed to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict in a World Politics course, and then went down the rabbit hole in making Middle Eastern politics my academic area of focus. And there’s only one place in the world where one can study Hebrew and complex political problems – Israel.

Obviously, a major goal of mine during my time abroad is a substantial improvement in my language skills. Academically, I hope to deepen my knowledge on subjects that are of interest to me, such as the global refugee crisis and the statecraft of Israel. Personally, I endeavor to make lifelong friends and meaningful connections. I also hope to extensively travel throughout Israel and go on some off-the-beaten-path adventures in Eastern Europe. Through my Hebrew class and a previous Jewish Studies course I have taken, I was luckily able to get ample exposure to the culture, history and politics of Israel. For my own benefit though, I began researching the public transportation of my host city as well as interesting shops and points of interest.