COEUR d'ALENE - Studying in a foreign country is an experience unlike any other, and it can change a person's life if he lets it, says Devin Sommer.

Sommer, 24, speaks from experience. He is allowing foreign study to change his own life right now.

The 2006 graduate of Lake City High School is 6,000 miles from his Coeur d'Alene home - living, learning and teaching in Turkey - on a grant he was awarded by the Fulbright United States Student Program, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

It is not the first time Sommer has traveled to the Eurasian country to study and teach English. He was in Turkey last spring, on a teaching and learning trip paid for by a Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship, another program funded by the U.S. Department of State.

Although he has applied for funding to study in Turkey more than once, Sommer says he doesn't feel he chose Turkey as his focus, but that it, rather, chose him.

"The first time I visited Turkey it was on a family vacation, and it was the year after 9/11," Sommer wrote in an email interview with The Press.

His family was living in northern New Jersey on Sept. 11, 2001, within close proximity of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.

Sommer was 16 when his family spent two days in Turkey, and he recalls feeling anxious about visiting a Muslim country.

"The Turkish people were so nice, friendly and helpful that I remember being embarrassed by the time I left for having felt any apprehension at all. I think this initial experience inspired me to choose Turkey again when the opportunity for me to study abroad came up," Sommer said.

One of his life goals has always been to be fluent in another language, any other language, and Turkish has become it. The language is challenging, Sommer said, but he is making good progress and hopes to have met his goal by the time his current grant, through the Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) program ends next year.

Meghann Curtis, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Academic Programs, said Turkey, one of 65 countries where the program is offered, has one of the largest Fulbright ETA programs in the world. This year, there are about 60 ETAs, placed in about 20 universities, mostly in rural areas, throughout Turkey. Sommer is at Canakkale Onsekiz Mart University.

"Devin has been placed in Canakkale, a city in the rural northwest of Turkey which is close to the site of ancient Troy, so the region is very rich in history," Curtis said. "Devin's colleagues in Canakkale benefit from his expertise as a young, native speaker of English, while Devin himself has the chance to learn more about Turkey's rich culture and history."

Sommer says this is an exciting time in history for Turkey, mainly due to a broad shift in foreign policy and relations with the West.

"Turkey is currently the only democratic Muslim country, which makes it unique, and also very important, unique in the sense that there is really nothing else you can really compare it to, and important because it illustrates that Islam is not at odds with democratic ideals, a free society and the modern world," Sommer said.

Turkey's economy experienced 11 percent growth last year, he said.

"Turkey is also starting to embrace the Muslim aspect of its cultural identity a little bit more. In fact, it will be really interesting to see what Turkey's role becomes as the politics and societies of other Arab countries develop in the wake of the recent revolutions," Sommer said. "Egyptian youth have already started looking to Turkey to aid in the development of their currently evolving government."

Sommer graduated in June from Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., with a bachelor's degree in language and diplomacy, after he returned from his spring stint in Turkey. From March to May he was teaching and doing volunteer work in Istanbul, with his Gilman scholarship funds.

He brought a bit of the Lake City with him into the classroom there - the children's storybook "Mudgy and Millie," featuring the moose and mouse's adventures in Coeur d'Alene.

With his younger students, Sommer used the book to teach numbers and nature vocabulary. As a reward at the end of class, they would play a 15-minute game of hide-and-seek, like the storybook characters do. The student seeker counted in English, and then called out that he was coming in English. "For my 13- to 14-year-old group I used it to practice reading, speaking, pronunciation, and I think I used the text to teach simple past tense lessons," Sommer said. "These students thought Mudgy was some kind of mutant camel. It was pretty funny."

Sommer hopes to one day have a career as a Foreign Service Officer for the U.S. Department of State.

He'd like to see more U.S. citizens reaping the benefits of international travel and study.

"I had so many friends right out of high school that thought the military was their only option. I want to encourage people to make studying abroad a component of their college careers, because international experience is a significant part of getting a truly augmented and well-rounded education," Sommer wrote. "There are some things you just can't learn from a book. You don't even need to attend a four-year school to make international study a part of your education. The experience is accessible to anyone who wants it enough."

That includes students enrolled in schools like North Idaho College, a two-year community college, Sommer said.

He is one of six Idaho and 24 Washington college students to participate in the Gilman scholarship program this year.

There are five U.S. students from Idaho colleges and universities, and 60 from Washington colleges and universities, who were awarded Fulbright grants for this academic year.