Category: Events

MIIS events

Pizza Party Success!

The Pizza Innovation Process is off to a good start. 47 faculty, staff & students enjoyed some pizza and brainstormed ideas to help shape MIIS. To get involved, join the Pizza Process Social Network.

The party started with a small group icebreaker activity where teams created pizzas with a topping for each member and a name that described the whole pizza.  The pizza process was then introduced followed by great conversations about the definition of innovation, barriers and drivers to innovation, and some tips for success in the process.  The party ended with pizza for all and ideas shared with the group.

If you couldn’t make the party, you’re not out of the process!  Interested innovators can join our social network and form a pizza group.  To “officially” register your group, set up an appointment with Lynn McDonald.  Groups should be diverse, passionate and fun to work towards finding solutions and making a better MIIS.  Ideas will be shared with the entire community on April 16th at the Idea Fair.

Last years pizza process produced the DMC, CNS Second Life and Delcats along with some good ideas that just didn’t stick.  Innovation is a risk, but also an invaluable learning experience with idea sharing and organizational development.  Groups this year will be working on building community, connecting with alumni, understanding and incorporating competition, building a knowledge base and so much more!

For more information, contact Lynn McDonald at lynn.mcdonald@miis.edu or ext. 4633.  Join us for this pizza journey!

Master Calendar Now Available Online

Trying to find contact information for that on-campus forum next month?  What are the dates for the recruiting visit to Eastern Europe this spring?  And where is next week’s Student Council meeting, anyway?

You may not know the answers to all of those questions yet, but now you can with just a few clicks of your mouse, thanks to the new MIIS master events calendar.  In an effort to reduce “calendar clutter,” a campus-wide team of staff recently researched and implemented a low-cost, off-the-shelf calendar solution.  The new master events calendar posted on the MIIS web site and on the Moodle homepage incorporates entries for:

Prospective Students
Student Affairs
Career Development
Institute Events
Alumni Events

For those with events to post, you should continue to work through the same channels you do today to get your events posted – see the full list of contact points and categories of events below — but now they will all be posted to this single master electronic calendar.  (Please remember that the Venue Reservation Policy issued by the President’s Office must be followed to reserve rooms for events.)

Calendar Contacts

Prospective Students
Robert Horgan and Alice Villemaire

Student Affairs (Student Council, clubs and associations, International Student Services and Student Affairs)
Ashley Arrocha and Shawna Routh

Career Development
Policy: Jen Hambleton
Business: Nina Dutra and Toni Thomas
Language Education: Jennifer Tuman
Translation and Interpretation: Jeff Wood

Institute Events (Speaker Series, President’s Forums, department and program events, conferences)
Linae Ishii-Devine and Dollie Pope

Alumni Events
Maureen Anda

Academic Events (Information and important dates, academic and special programs)
Policy: Nathan Westrup
Business: Nina Dutra and Toni Thomas
Language Education: Jennifer Tuman
Translation and Interpretation: Karen Weiss

Third Community Retreat Looks at Advising

Fifty-nine faculty, staff and students helped to plan the new, unified advising function that will ensure future students a seamless educational experience at MIIS.

Held at the La Playa hotel in Carmel on Friday, February 27, the retreat provided an opportunity to build on conversations begun at the previous retreats on February 20 by creating road maps of the ideal student experience and describing the relationships we need to build in order to get there.

Notes from the retreat are posted in an online Reorganization Resource Center and members of the community are invited to comment or add their ideas.

Pizza Process 2009

It’s back!  The process that brought us the Digital Media Commons, CNS Second Life and DELCAT has resurfaced.  It’s back with the hope of finding innovative ideas to help shape the institute.  The kickoff event will be an innovation pizza party on March 3rd, 12 – 2 PM in CF 434.  Please RSVP.

People always ask me “can we really keep creating new programs?” to which I reply that innovation does not always mean invention.  We’re looking for new perspectives to solve old problems and keep the institute moving forward.  Nike innovated the running sneaker not because it invented the shoe but because it made us think of sneakers in a whole new way.  Apple’s iphone is innovative because it redefined what a phone could do.

We’re looking to form diverse groups, give them pizza, and see what amazing ideas unfold.  The goals of the kickoff event will be to clarify the process, understand innovation and brainstorm possible ideas.  You don’t have to have an idea to be part of this process!  We hope to inspire groups to tackle known problems at the institute to find collective solutions.

Join us on March 3rd to start this innovation journey.  If you can’t make it on the 3rd, stay tuned for updates and contact Lynn McDonald if you want to get involved or start a group.

More Information

RSVP for March 3rd

MONTEREY INSTITUTE & NPS HOST AWARD-WINNING CYBER-ACTIVIST

–Founder of MideastYouth.com Harnesses Internet to Promote Human Rights–

The Monterey Institute of International Studies will host award-winning activist and writer Esra’a al Shafei beginning at 6:15 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 24, in the Institute’s Irvine Auditorium in the McCone Building at 499 Pierce St., Monterey.  The event is being co-sponsored by the Naval Postgraduate School.

During her “Activism 3.0” presentation, Shafei will discuss her experiences as founder and executive director of Mideast Youth, and how cyber-activism can help to combat human rights abuses and foster peace.  Her accolades include the Harvard University’s 2008 Berkman Award, and her live podcasts and blogs from Gaza during the recent conflict there were featured on CNN.

This event is free and open to the public.  NOTE: Photography and videotaping will not be permitted at this event.  Audio recording is permitted.

Planning Retreats Generate Ideas for GSIPM, GSTILE

Seventy faculty staff and students met on Friday morning at La Playa hotel in Carmel to discuss ideas for ensuring academic excellence through the merger of the policy and business school, and their collaboration with a new office of advising, career and student services.  They were joined for lunch by an additional 50 faculty, staff and students representing translation, interpretation and language education progrms.  The latter group stayed on for their own afternoon retreat to develop ideas for  the new graduate school encompassing all language-related programs.

After hearing briefly from President Ramaswamy and the new academic leadership team — provost Amy Sands and deans designate Renee Jourdenais, Tate Miller, and Yuwei Shi — about the vision for the reorganization and the goals of the retreat, each group spent most of the allotted four hours in break-out sessions discussing questions designed to elicit ideas for exploiting synergies between programs within and across schools, and for developing strong relationships between academic programs and the new advising function.  Notes from the retreat are posted in an online Reorganization Resource Center and members of the community are invited to comment or add their ideas.

GSIPM NOTES

GSTILE NOTES

You can either read the notes directly on the site, at the links above, or scroll to the bottom of the page to download a Word file.  Please note that the notes are numbered by group in the order in which we received them, not by the table numbers at the retreat.

A third retreat devoted to the new Office of Advising, Career, and Student Services is planned for Friday, February 27 from 1-5 pm (preceded by lunch from 12-1), also at La Playa. There are still spaces open in this retreat, although there is very limited availability for the lunch. Contact Amy McGill if you are interested in attending.

Monterey FORUM 2009 Focuses on Assessment

Assessment in the training of translators and interpreters will be the topic of the 2009 Forum sponsored by the Graduate School of Translation and Interpretation.  Beginning the evening of Thursday, April 2 with a lecture by Christiane Nord of Heidelberg University, the conference sessions on Friday and Saturday offer a wide range of international speakers, including sessions interpreted by MIIS students. The Forum wraps up on Sunday, April 6 with a lecture by Franz Pöchhacker of the University of Vienna.

Register by contacting translate@miis.edu.
Registration Fees:
General $150
MIIS alumni $75

For further information, please contact kayoko.takeda@miis.edu, or download the complete schedule.

Zilinskas to Speak on Agroterrorism

Ray Zilinskas, senior scientist at JMCNS, will be a featured speaker at the Monterey County Health Education Consortium’s January 22 seminar for health professionals entitled, “Keeping the Salad Bowl Safe: How We Prevent and Investigate Foodborne-related Illnesses.” Zilinskas will speak on “Agroterrorism, Post-harvest Food Sabotage, and Emergency Preparedness.”  See the attached pdf for additional information.

J.D. Yuan Speaks at Woodrow Wilson Panel on China-Pakistan Relations

J.D. Yuan, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at JMCNS and associate professor of international policy studies, is one of three speakers at a panel entitled “Storm Clouds Ahead for the ‘All-Weather Allies’? Today’s Pakistan-China Relationship,” sponosred by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.  You can watch a live webcast of the panel on January 26 at 3:30 p.m., eastern time.

The “Un” Book Club

Come join the new MIIS “Un” book club!

In an effort to continue the dialog started in the engaging in change workshop, a new “un” book club has organically formed through the chatter of yammer.  The group has picked Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell as the first book to discuss.

So why is it an “un” book club?

While books are a great way to learn, they are in no way shape or form the only way to grasp a concept.  This book club goes beyond the book and encourages everyone to use their own preferred medium to understand the ideas.  Anything goes – video, podcasts, books, websites – just come ready to have a discussion about the main concepts presented in the book.  Heck, you could even read a different book!

I’m in – how do I join!

We’re trying to schedule our first lunchtime meeting next week.  Fill out your available times on our poll and Lynn McDonald will follow up with a personal email with the time and location.  At this meeting we’ll discuss how we want to continue – figure out a good group name, meeting or not meeting schedule, food norms, and our main objective.  If you can’t make our first meeting, updates will be posted on yammer.

See you next week!

Clara Yu Honored by City of Monterey and MIIS Colleagues

On Tuesday, December 16, the City of Monterey City Council honored MIIS President Clara Yu for her accomplishments over the past three years.  Later, at the annual faculty and staff holiday party, colleagues paid tribute to Clara and wished Clara and John a fond and regretful farewell.  Thanks, Clara, for everything, from all of us!

Staff Members Discuss Formation of Representative Group

Fifty staff members met Thursday afternoon in Irvine auditorium to initiate discussion about providing an ongoing and sustained voice for staff at the Monterey Institute.

The meeting was facilitated by Provost Amy Sands, but was quickly turned over to break-out groups of staff members who brainstormed possible approaches to representation.

There was broad interest in developing a vehicle analogous to the faculty senate that would represent staff perspectives and concerns in a constructive way that contributes to excellence across the institution.  A working group emerged from this meeting, charged with looking at next steps, such as:

1) Getting more info about who staff are at MIIS;
2) Looking at other institutions to see how their staffs are organized,
starting with Middlebury;
3) Talking to Jeff Wood and others who might have been directly
involved with previous MIIS Staff Groups;
4) Expanding the group of 6 to include 10-12 core members since several staff groups could not attend yesterday’s meeting.

The working group members are:

Karen Weiss
Priscilla Lorenzo
Toni Thomas
Lynn McDonald
Susan Wolfe
Erika Johnson

An Invitation to Be the Solution!

Contribute to a community-wide perspective on big issues: academic excellence, interdisciplinary synergies, Monterey Way 2.0 teaching and learning, student-centered services, “one MIIS.”

Identify and prioritize tasks that need to be accomplished in a semester-long planning process.

What: Half day planning retreats in support of administrative reorganization

Who: Faculty, Staff and Students – choose one or more retreats to attend, based on your interests. Sign up HERE.

When:

* Graduate School of International Policy and Management – Friday, February 20, retreat from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon, followed by lunch from 12:00 noon to 1:00 p.m.
* Graduate School of Translation, Interpretation and Language Education – Friday, February 20, lunch from 12:00 noon to 1:00 p.m., retreat from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
* Advising and Student Services – Friday, February 27, lunch from 12:00 noon to 1:00 p.m., retreat from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Where: All retreats will take place at the La Playa Hotel in Carmel

Why: The retreats are designed to kick off a semester-long planning process resulting in organizational roadmaps for the two new graduate schools and for a new office of advising and student services.

Expected outcomes include:

* A sense of common purpose and direction, as we move forward
* Excitement about new ideas and synergies
* A set of planning groups with clear tasks for the spring semester, leading to a smooth implementation of the new organizational structure in the summer of 2009

Examples of some of the questions we will consider:

* What will the internal structure of each school look like?
* How will we encourage synergies in program development between the two schools?
* How will the new program heads function within each school, vis-a-vis their deans, their faculty?
* How will the advising and student services functions be organized?
* How will the advising and student services staff interact with the two schools?
* How will the advising and student services functions interact with other administrative areas, such as admissions and alumni relations?
* How will we encourage-disciplinary collaboration and research opportunities among programs and schools?

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS AN FAQ ON THE REORGANIZATION PLANNING PROCESS.

“Engaging with Change” Workshops Resume

A reminder for staff participating in the “Engaging with Change” workshop series with Dr. Paul Porter:  the third session will take place on Tuesday, December 2, and the final workshop will take place on Monday, December 15. Location: Board Room.

Last Friday TLC offered a digital storytelling workshop in which participants created a “superhero” based on the strengths they identified in the first two workshops.  Check this out.

MIIS, DLI Sponsor Panel Discussion

The Monterey Institute of International Studies and the Defense Language
Institute cordially invite you to attend a panel discussion, titled
“Leadership in a Time of War”, on Wednesday, November 19 from 6:30PM –
8:00PM in the Irvine Auditorium, featuring:

* LTC Danial Pick, former Army Attaché, U.S. Embassy, Amman, Jordan and
Iraq Policy Officer, Office of the Secretary of Defense.

* Bill Murphy Jr., author of In a Time of War: The Proud and Perilous
Journey of West Point’s Class of 2002 and a former Army JAG office who
reported from Iraq for The Washington Post.

* Mike Cerre, an Emmy-award winning journlist for ABC News in Iraq who
served as an USMC officer in Vietnam.

* CPT Fergal O’Reilly, a former platoon leader with the 82nd Airborne in
Afghanistan and Iraq, who is now assigned to the Defense Language
Institute.

The discussion will be moderated by Capt DJ Skelton, who was wounded
during U.S. combat operations in Fallujah, Iraq in Nov 2004.  He is one of
the leading U.S. Army advocates for Wounded Warriors, playing a key role
in strategic policy development and analysis regarding care for wounded
servicemen and who currently serves at the Defense Language Institute.
Bios for all of the participants (except O’Reilly) are attached.

Join these Iraq war veterans and the author of an important new book on
the sacrifices of young American Army officers for a discussion about
country, service, and leadership in a time of war.

There will be a light reception in the McCone Atrium immediately following
the panel discussion.