As prepared for delivery...

Ladies and gentlemen, Fulbright Board Members, alumni and friends of the Fulbright Commission, I am honored to join the Fulbright Commission tonight in opening this art exhibition and in hosting this reception. We are here to celebrate the centenary of the birth of J. William Fulbright, a great man, a distinguished American, and the founder of one of the world’s most successful international educational exchange programs, the Fulbright Program.

It’s a pleasure to see all of you this evening -- individuals devoted to increasing mutual understanding between the people of the United States and Cyprus and supporters of the Fulbright Program’s vital role in this effort. Such an investment is even more important now than when the program started in Cyprus over forty years ago.

A wise American – the poet Robert Frost – once said that education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence. It was another wise American, J.W. Fulbright, who put that principle into practice in the service of international peace and understanding.

J. William Fulbright, born in 1905, was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and then the U.S. Senate. For almost half his Senate career, he chaired the prestigious Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In 1946, Senator Fulbright sponsored legislation that led to the creation of the Fulbright Program of international education and cultural exchange. Senator Fulbright’s passionate commitment to what can be accomplished through international exchange lives on in the hearts and minds of more than two hundred thousand individuals around the world, including in Cyprus, who share the honor to be known as “Fulbright Scholars.”

Senator Fulbright was an advocate of détente and mutual understanding between cultures long before such ideas were in vogue. He believed that:

“Education is the best means - probably the only means - by which nations can cultivate a degree of objectivity about each other’s behavior and intentions…Educational exchange can turn nations into people, contributing as no other form of communication can to the humanizing of international relations.”

Since its inception more than fifty years ago, 255,000 “Fulbrighters,” 96,400 from the United States and 158,000 from other countries, have participated in the Program. The Fulbright Program awards approximately 4,500 new grants annually.

Individuals are selected on the basis of academic or professional qualifications and potential, plus ability and willingness to share ideas and experiences with people of diverse cultures. Fulbright alumni around the world include Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, prime ministers and heads of state, governors and senators, ambassadors and artists, professors and scientists, Supreme Court Justices, and CEOs.

The primary source of funding for the Fulbright Program worldwide is an annual Congressional appropriation, which last year totaled $148 million. Participating governments, as well as host institutions in the United States and abroad, also contribute through cost-sharing and indirect support.

It was 43 years ago this year that the United States entered into a cultural exchange agreement with Cyprus that established the Cyprus Fulbright Commission. That program has awarded 660 traditional grants to Cypriots since its founding in 1962, and brought 142 American senior scholars to the island (in the program Craig mentioned in his introduction). We welcome the support received from the Government of Cyprus for the Fulbright Commission. During the past nine years, in fact, its annual financial contribution even topped those from my own country. I hope such support will continue.

In the 1980s, we complemented the traditional Fulbright program by asking the Commission to take on administration of a second exchange program, the Cyprus America Scholarship program or CASP. This program is fully funded by the United States. Over the past 24 years, it has helped over 1,717 Cypriots to complete undergraduate or graduate degrees in the United States. The Cyprus Fulbright family is proud to count returning CASP scholars among its alumni. It goes without saying that the prestige of the Fulbright name and the dedication and persistence of the skilled Fulbright staff on the island have contributed to this program’s accomplishments.

All together, these programs have sponsored nearly 2,400 Cypriots for academic study in the United States. In addition, about 3,700 Cypriots have participated in various bicommunal workshops, seminars and youth camp programs.

For 43 years, Americans and Cypriots have thus shared experiences, education, traditions and culture through organized exchanges. That has enriched both societies. These programs have helped Americans understand that Cyprus is not a tree, a Los Angeles county or place in Florida, but a small island in the Mediterranean, which we should care about, with a difficult past, but with great future potential. They have helped Cypriots better understand what America is all about. And, perhaps most important of all, they have given Greek and Turkish Cypriots new perspectives from which to look at themselves and relations between their communities.

Just the other day, for example, I met with a bicommunal group of young CASP students who studied in the U.S. last summer. They were enthusiastic about their stay in the U.S. and returned with much enthusiasm about America. But their experience of being treated as Cypriots -- not as Greek or Turkish Cypriots, but Cypriots -- helped them learn even more about themselves. Acknowledging their indifference to young people from “the other side” prior to this trip, one student confidently told me on their return that they had “solved the Cyprus problem.” Idealistic? Perhaps, but heartening nevertheless. In sum, we regard our support for such educational exchanges, which we are determined to continue, as a sound investment both in America’s relationship with Cyprus as well as in a better future for all Cypriots.

The Cyprus Fulbright Commission’s administration of the traditional Fulbright program and CASP has amply fulfilled the overarching purposes of these exchanges, contributing both to America and Cyprus. One measure of this is the success and accomplishments of each and every grantee. Looking around the room at those in attendance tonight, I can tell you that Cyprus should be justly proud of her Fulbright and CASP alumni.

In closing let me, let me recall these words of Senator Fulbright:

“Our future is not in the stars but in our own minds and hearts. Creative leadership and liberal education, which in fact go together, are the first requirements for a hopeful future for mankind. Fostering these - leadership, learning and empathy between cultures - was and remains the purpose of the international scholarship program that I was privileged to sponsor in the U.S. Senate.”

In that spirit, I would like to reiterate my support to this wonderful Program and to say how proud I am to be associated with the Fulbright Commission in Cyprus.

I would like to thank all the participating artists, who are all alumni of this Program, and thank you all for coming this evening.

Enjoy the Exhibition!