2024 International Awards: Jonathan Choti

MSU Award for Outstanding Service to Education Abroad

Published: Tuesday, 26 Mar 2024   Author: Jonathan Gibson

Jonathan Choti is a 2024 recipient of the MSU Award for Outstanding Service to Education Abroad, which recognizes faculty and staff who give their time, energy and creativity to the development and implementation of education abroad programs that support MSU's commitment to providing students with high-quality international education opportunities.

Choti is a teaching-focused associate professor of African Languages and Cultures in the Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures. He teaches Swahili language and courses focused on African cultures, particularly social customs, livelihoods, gender/sexuality issues, and technology. Choti also directs a summer education abroad program known as "Sustainable Community Development in Tanzania".

With research interests concentrated on Bantu languages, second language education, and DEI in education, Choti co-authored a book in 2022 titled "Descriptive and Theoretical Approaches in African Linguistics: Selected papers from the 49th Annual Conference on African Linguistics". He is the president of the African Language Teachers Association (ALTA) and has served in executive boards of the Association of Contemporary African Linguistics (ACAL) and the National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages (NCOLTCL).

Choti's accomplishments include several awards, grants, and fellowships, including Mid-Michigan Spartans Quality in Undergraduate Teaching Awards, Excellence Award in Interdisciplinary Scholarship, Creating Inclusive Excellence Grant, Network for Global Civic Engagement Grant, Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship (CADFP), Mozilla's Responsible Computing Challenge Grant (RCC), Lilly Teaching Fellowship, AAP's Transforming Institutions Strategic Partnership Grant, GenCen's Strategic Partnership Grant, and MSU Award for Outstanding Service to Education Abroad. 

Choti holds a Ph.D. in Linguistics from MSU, as well as an MA in English Language and a BA in English and Swahili Linguistics from Egerton University in Kenya.

Choti was nominated by Leo Zulu, associate professor of Geography and interim director of the African Studies Center. "His passion and energy for educating students about Africa through experiential learning has been pivotal in the [Sustainable Community Development in Tanzania] program's success," said Zulu.