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Ellison, Romano named MSU’s latest Critical Language Scholars

Contact: Carl Smith

STARKVILLE, Miss.—Two Mississippi State undergraduates are receiving prestigious U.S. Department of State scholarships allowing them to study foreign languages abroad this summer.

Alexis Ellison, a senior accounting major from Woodland, will study Mandarin in Taiwan, while Joseph “Hays” Romano, a senior political science and foreign language double major from Alabaster, Alabama, will study Japanese in Japan.

This is the eighth straight year an MSU student has been awarded through this extremely competitive scholarship program. Approximately 315 students were chosen from more than 4,500 applicants nationwide this year.

Ellison, a student in the Judy and Bobby Shackouls Honors College, plans to work in accounting and as a financial analyst for an international company after graduation. She also represented MSU as a Critical Language Scholar in 2025, studying Mandarin in Taiwan.

As an MSU recipient of the prestigious Fulbright UK Summer Institute scholarship, Romano, spent three weeks at the 2025 Lancaster University Summer Institute on Film. The Shackouls Honors College student was MSU’s first recipient of the Donna L. Clevinger Endowed Scholarship in Creative and Performing Arts.

Two other Bulldogs—Madelynn Green, a senior anthropology and philosophy double major from Russellville, Alabama, and Elizabeth Orton, a biomedical engineering major from Madison, Alabama—were named CLS alternates. Green previously studied Arabic virtually through the CLS Spark program in 2025, and both are members of the honors college.

MSU’s Office of Prestigious External Scholarships connects students to competitive scholarships and fellowships, providing support during their application processes. Learn more about the office and Shackouls Honors College at ČčČÔ»ćÌę.

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