Cornell senior awarded Fulbright grant

MOUNT VERNON – Ryan Taugher, a senior international relations major from Madison, Wis., has been awarded a Fulbright grant. Starting in September he will spend nine months in Turkey studying and researching the international impact of controlling the region’s water resources.

The Turkish government has started a $32 billion project to build 22 dams to control the Tigris and Euphrates rivers for agricultural and social development. The dams are limiting water resources to countries downstream, such as Syria and Iraq.

This will be Ryan’s third stint in Turkey. As a high school senior he was an exchange student, and last summer he returned to Turkey with a University of Iowa School of Engineering course. He is the 18th Cornell student to receive a Fulbright grant since 1956. He is currently on an internship at the National Defense University Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies in Washington, D.C.