Case study

The Fulbright Program relies on Hivebrite to create a global community to support alumni and grantees to prosper

The flagship international educational exchange program partnered with Hivebrite to build a passionate, caring, and global community to help members thrive personally and professionally.

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“Hivebrite’s platform has made parts of my working day 110% easier by empowering Fulbrighters to connect, exchange, and collaborate with each other—something that previously required considerable manual intervention from the team.”

Rob Ellis
Community Manager at Fulbrighter

30,000+

Active members

27%

Members active in a single month

180

Countries with active members

About Fulbright

The Fulbright Program is a world-renowned cultural exchange program designed to improve intercultural relations, share knowledge across communities, and build intercultural competence between the people of the United States and other countries through the exchange of persons, knowledge, and skills.

Mission

Fulbrighter is the exclusive online networking platform for Fulbright alumni and grantees. It is a space where they can connect, network, engage and collaborate with the global community of Fulbrighters.

Visit the community

How the Fulbright Program leveraged Hivebrite to empower students, researchers, and professionals across the globe.

Fulbright has been using Hivebrite since 2017. They chose Hivebrite as their solution to advance their mission and create a more intentional space for connection, collaboration, and support.

The community challenge

Since its launch in 1948, the Fulbright Program has empowered over 400,000 students, researchers, and professionals across the globe. These individuals, known as Fulbrighters, have gone on to become leaders in their fields—spanning academia, science, public service, business, and the arts. The program’s long-standing legacy of fostering cross-cultural understanding and academic excellence has created a powerful global network of changemakers committed to collaboration and mutual exchange.

Recognizing the immense potential within its alumni and grantee community, Fulbright sought to create a more intentional space for connection, collaboration, and support. The goal was to bring together this diverse group of individuals—spanning generations and disciplines—in a way that would help them grow both personally and professionally. By strengthening these ties, Fulbright aimed to not only enhance the alumni experience but also extend the program’s long-term impact through sustained relationships and knowledge sharing.

Prior to this effort, Fulbright relied heavily on spreadsheets and scattered social media groups to stay in touch with its alumni, making it difficult to foster meaningful interactions or maintain accurate data. The lack of a centralized platform or cohesive strategy limited engagement and made it nearly impossible to scale efforts effectively. Without the right tools or structure, opportunities for collaboration were often missed, and the full potential of the Fulbright network remained untapped.

Hivebrite’s full-stack community platform enabled Fulbright to:

Facilitate organic connections

Foster independent sub-communities to enable connections while maintaining institutional governance

Create a repository of knowledge

Build a centralized knowledge hub that leverages member expertise

Encourage collaboration and innovation

Facilitate partnerships and networks to drive industry advancement and promote innovation

Gather data and insights

Monitor user behavior, engagement metrics, and content performance to measure the impact of initiatives

The Hivebrite solution

The Fulbright Program partnered with Hivebrite to create Fulbrighter, a single collaborative community to connect and engage Fulbright alumni and grantees worldwide.

Hivebrite’s modular nature enabled the Fulbright team to launch the community with only the essential features for its community strategy to avoid overwhelming members. The team activates additional features as the strategy evolves and engagement grows or based on member feedback.

The interactive directory facilitates connecting members and encouraging meaningful relationships. It allows members to quickly and easily search for peers based on criteria such as location, profession, and even if they are interested in meeting for a coffee. The directory’s map gives a visual snapshot of all members’ locations on a global map.

Members can connect and direct message others on a global scale, as well as leverage the collective knowledge and experience of the community by requesting help or advice in the community’s global newsfeed.

The news feed also offers the ideal place for members to post their news and celebrate their achievements with the entire community. Members can also develop their careers by posting or applying for jobs on the community’s virtual jobs board. 

With the growing expansion of virtual events, Fulbrighter has also become a key hub for promoting and managing events that can be attended by global audiences.

The community offers nearly 200 subgroups based on location, identity, and discipline. The subgroups, managed by volunteers, encourage more engagement with personalized exchanges, content, and support.

Key features designed for higher education

Groups and sub-communities

Private, public, or hidden sub-communities with tailored permissions and communications.

Jobs and opportunities

Promote jobs, internships, and volunteer roles with a flexible board. Workflows and alerts help spread opportunities.

News, content, and resources

Share timely updates and news to keep members engaged and informed about your community. 

Events and ticketing

Host virtual and IRL events with RSVP, paid ticketing, and QR codes. Use community to enrich the experience throughout.

Member Directory & Profile

Connect donors, volunteers, and beneficiaries, fostering global member engagement and a stronger community.

The outcome

Fulbrighter is home to over 30,000 members from over 180 countries, and from every year of the Fulbright program from 1948 onwards. The community reached a high of 27% active members in a month—a testament to Fulbrighter’s community strategy and the platform’s user-friendliness.

Over 800 events have been promoted in the community in three years, and almost 8,000 live feed posts and comments have been created.

When surveyed, 72% of members stated that they believed the program had successfully built a global community, up from 44% when the platform launched three years ago.

“We now have a passionate, caring, and centralized community that enables all members to continue to benefit from the Fulbright experience, develop personally and professionally, and essentially become Fulbrighters for life.”

Rob Ellis
Community Manager at Fulbrighter