Alumni and Grantee News
Fulbright Iceland
A new Alumni Board was elected at the Fulbright Alumni Association annual meeting in January. The new chair is Meg Matich (Fulbright Fellow 2016) and other board members are Sólveig Sanchez (Fulbright Visiting Student Researcher 2023) and Margaret Cormack (Fulbright Scholar 1994 and 2000).
The spring alumni activity was the annual Fulbright Forest event, where current grantees and alumni planted 160 birch trees. The Fulbright Forest now contains 1,760 trees, bringing us another step closer to the goal of planting one tree for every Fulbright grantee. The tree planting was followed by an alumni happy hour, which also included current U.S. grantees, and where fun was had by all.
Fulbright alumni continue to make their mark across academia, education, research and the arts, both in Iceland and abroad. Here are a few highlights from earlier this year.
- Bjarki Þórsson (Fulbright Fellow 2021) has been appointed the Deputy Chief of Mission at the Embassy of Iceland in Oslo.
- Hongjie Xie (Distinguished Fulbright-NSF Arctic Research Scholar 2024) co-authored a paper on the seasonal mass balance of Hofsjökull ice cap, based on his research and collaboration in Iceland, in Remote Sensing of Environment journal this summer.
- Fulbright alumnus Magnús Tumi Guðmundsson (2010 Fulbright Visiting Scholar), co-authored the article “Forecasting Volcanic Eruptions Across Scales” with Christopher J. Bean. The article was published in Science in May.
- Fulbright Alumna Berglind María Tómasdóttir (Fulbright Fellow 2008) was appointed Dean of the Department of Music at the Iceland University of the Arts.
- Meghan Orman (Fulbright-NSF Arctic Research Fellow 2022) has taken on a new position as Director of the Early Learning Center at Auburn University in Alabama.
- Margrét Jónsdóttir Njarðvík (Fulbright Fellow 1992) was appointed Principal of Fjölbrautaskólinn í Breiðholti (FB) for a five-year term, beginning in August 2026.
- Gunnlaugur Björnsson (Fulbright Fellow 2015) has joined Bowling Green State University as an Assistant Teaching Professor of Composition.
- Kristin Jonina Taylor’s (Fulbright Fellow 2004) new album, Midwest Piano Sonatas, was named a finalist for the Best Album (Performance or Composition) in the 5th Petrichor International Music Competition.
- Sigrún Sigurðardóttir (FAI Scholar 2024-2026) published a new book, Áfall og hvað svo?, on trauma and its consequences.
- Konstantine Vlasis (Fulbright-NSF Arctic Research and Fulbright-National Geographic Fellow 2024) successfully defended his D. dissertation in Music at New York University in April.
We are always pleased to hear what members of the Fulbright community are doing after their grants. Alumni are encouraged to stay in touch and share professional, academic and personal milestones with Fulbright Iceland, so that we can share with the wider Fulbright community.