The U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board announces that two Alfred University students have received Fulbright U.S. Student Program awards for the 2026-2027 academic year. Michelle Seo, who earned an M.F.A. from Alfred in 2025, will be going to South Korea to pursue an independent research project. Lily Janik, a senior at Alfred who will graduate May 16, was awarded an English teaching assistant grant in Taiwan.
Seo’s research will focus on Korean funeral practices, including studying funerary objects in museums, doing field visits, and pursuing studio work that responds to her research. In Seo’s Statement of Purpose to the Fulbright Commission—titled “The Korean Funeral: The Sang Yeo Procession”—Seo said she drew inspiration for her project from the recent passing of her grandmother.
“The funeral of my recently deceased grandmother was cold and abrupt. To navigate my grief, I began researching the mourning culture of Korea and found the Sang Yeo procession,” Seo wrote. She explained that the Sang Yeo, “the last gift you can give,” is a beautiful wooden bier that is carried on the shoulders of the bereaved from funeral site to burial ground, followed by family and friends.
“Sang Yeo Procession is a project that researches and records the objects and ritualistic practices of Korea’s funeral culture to recover the cultural practice that is going extinct among Korean Americans,” she said, noting that she will work with curators, artists, and contemporary Sang Yeo craftsmen to create an artist book that archives funerary objects paired with notes and descriptions made accessible in English. Additionally, she will create a body of work that reflects the melding of the historical research with contemporary narratives to continue on the rituals and functions of the studied objects in clay, paper, and performance.
“Objective and subjective translations of the work will be brought back to my community in America,” Seo stated. “Using my experiences of translation and fluency in the Korean and English languages, I will mend the gaps of cultural information of the Korean funeral—of its preparation, objects, rituals, performances, and its history. In particular, the project will focus on the funeral ritual utilizing the Sang Yeo procession.”
Lily Janik, who is one of two winners of the 2026 Marlin Miller Outstanding Senior Award, is pursuing a bachelor’s degree with four majors—communication studies, political science, global studies, and history—with minors in economics, international business, and Chinese language and culture. She contributed to the founding of Chinese Language and Culture minor last spring.
An Alfred University Honors student, Janik is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa. She founded two student clubs— Alfred SCUBA and Snorkeling Club, for which she serves as president, and the Chinese Language and Culture Club (former president, current vice president).
Lily helped to develop a Chinese Language Minor with her Chinese language instructor, Daisy Wu, clinical assistant professor of music and language, and in founding the Chinese Language and Culture Club. She also worked to increase local interest in Asian culture, teaching high school and university students the basics of the Dragon Dance, leading as master of ceremonies for the campus’s Lunar New Year celebrations, and co-organizing yearly Moon Festival activities. Now in her third year of Chinese, she tested to level 3 proficiency. “Learning a language has never come easy to me but my Chinese teacher took me under her wing. She helped me build confidence by finding practical ways for me to use the language and allowed me to take a leadership role in planning cultural events,” Janik said.
An Army ROTC cadet since January 2024, Janik graduated Air Assault School in 2025. She will be commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army after commencement May 16.
The applications were submitted to the Fulbright Committee last October and the students were recently notified of the award status. The Fulbright Program is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. federal government and is designed to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries. The primary source of funding for the program is an annual appropriation made by the U.S. Congress to the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
Participating governments, host institutions, corporations, and foundations in foreign countries and in the United States also provide direct and indirect support. Recipients of Fulbright grants are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement, as well as demonstrated leadership potential in their fields. The Program, established in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late U.S. Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas operates in over 160 countries worldwide.
