Clemencia El Antouri, a fourth-year student from Covington, Georgia, is pursuing studies in International Affairs and Romance Languages. She is one of 3 recipients of the 2024 Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Graduate Fellowship at the University of Georgia.
The Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Graduate Fellowship is a prestigious program by the U.S. Department of State for students interested in careers in foreign affairs. The program aims to prepare to qualified college seniors and college graduates who represent ethnic, gender, social, and geographic diversity for Foreign Service careers in the U.S. Department of State.
Recipients receive up to $84,000 for graduate school for any two-year master’s degree, a summer 2025 internship at Capitol Hill, a summer 2026 internship at a U.S. embassy abroad, and private mentoring with a current senior Foreign Service. Upon completion, recipients will join the Foreign Service as Foreign Service Officers with a minimum five-year service requirement. Clemencia is one of 45 Pickering Fellows chosen out of hundreds of applicants from colleges and universities around the country.
On campus, she is an ambassador for the School of Public and International Affairs, a Security Leadership Fellow at the Center for International Trade and Security, a member of the Mary Lyndon Hall French Language Community, and a Junior Advisor for the Office of Global Engagement. She is also a research associate for BSI America, a consulting firm focused on supply chain management.
Her interests in Middle Eastern affairs and democratic erosion led Clemencia to present her research on democratic backsliding in Turkey at the 2023 SPIA Undergraduate Research Colloquium. During Clemencia’s time at UGA, she studied abroad in Kyoto, Japan, and Cadiz, Spain.
Then as a Gilman Scholar, Clemencia studied advanced Arabic while interning in Amman, Jordan with the non-governmental organization Partners Jordan focusing on humanitarian development. Clemencia speaks Arabic, Spanish, and French and is currently learning Mandarin Chinese.
“It is a dream come true to be named a Pickering Fellow as I knew I always wanted an international career in which I could make a difference in the political area. The Pickering Fellowship enables me to pursue this path directly while also joining a cohort of scholars who share my passion for international affairs, languages, and traveling.”
To learn more about the Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Graduate Fellowship Program, visit pickeringfellowship.org. To learn more about Global Education at UGA, visit studyaway.uga.edu.