W&L’s Tara Trinley ’25 Earns Fulbright to Moldova Trinley was selected for a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to teach English in Moldova and plans to pursue a career in transnational litigation.

By Emily Innes
June 5, 2025

Washington and Lee University graduate Tara Trinley ’25 has been awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) to teach English in Moldova. At W&L, Trinley majored in history with a minor in East European and Russian studies. Trinley is from Palm Beach, Florida, and graduated from Boca Raton Community High School.

The ETA program in Moldova offers educational opportunities for Moldovan students and promotes grassroots diplomacy, fostering relationships between Moldova and the United States.

Trinley views the ETA as an important step in advancing her career interests in diplomacy, education and translation, and looks forward to enhancing her interpersonal skills and gaining valuable cross-cultural experience through her work with Moldovan students and communities. Her honors thesis centered on questions of ethno-nationalism, the treatment of ethnic minorities and minority languages in the post-Soviet space, and she hopes that immersing herself in Moldova’s complex linguistic and cultural landscape will better inform her continued research.

“I am deeply humbled to be selected for one of our nation’s most competitive and respected international exchange programs,” Trinley said. “I am eager to have a direct impact on my students and make a difference, and the ability to navigate a multilingual, politically complex environment will be a critical asset in my future career as an attorney interested in questions of transnational litigation.”

The ETA program gives Trinley the chance to not only begin learning Romanian, but to continue exercising her Russian language skills, which she built through several W&L study abroad opportunities. Trinley felt her Russian proficiency “transformed” when she received the Boren Scholarship in 2023 and spent nine months in Armenia, living with a Russian-speaking host family and studying at Yerevan State University. Trinley then studied international law in England the summer following the Boren experience, and she credits “this combination of classroom instruction, immersion and real-world experience” with further shaping her time at W&L and preparing her for the Fulbright program.

Trinley recognizes that studying such a complex region as Moldova demands constant reflection, humility and the recognition that full understanding will always remain just out of reach for her as an American, and she is grateful to the diverse communities who have shaped her journey at W&L and beyond, including her family, who first sparked her fascination with such a dynamic part of the world. She also appreciates the support she has received from Alana Holland, assistant professor of history, and Anna Brodsky, chair of the department of East European and Russian studies.

“Tara is passionately committed to service and leadership,” said Holland, who served as Trinley’s research adviser. “She regularly builds classroom community by lifting others up and approaching complex issues with nuance and creativity toward a common goal. Her integrity, commitment to cross-cultural dialogue and ability to combine international, historical and legal perspectives toward confronting the most pressing issues of the day make her a fearless intellectual leader in the world. I am so excited for her journey.”

At W&L, Trinley served as the editor for the Washington and Lee Political Review and was a founding member of the Slavic Society. She held leadership positions in Pi Beta Phi sorority and Hillel, and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa and Omicron Delta Kappa honor societies. She also competed in Mock Trial for two years.

With the Fulbright award, Trinley will depart in September 2025 for her nine-month program. Upon completion of the program, Trinley intends to go to law school and specialize in questions of transnational litigation, as well as maintain her Russian language skills and learn additional regional languages like Polish and Ukrainian.

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Washington and Lee University is proud to be included on the list of U.S. colleges and universities that produced the most 2024-2025 Fulbright U.S. Students for the seventh consecutive year.

The Fulbright Program was established more than 75 years ago to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries. Fulbright is the world’s largest and most diverse international educational exchange program. The primary source of funding for the Fulbright Program is an annual appropriation made by the U.S. Congress to the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

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