We are excited to share with you an amazing opportunity to explore the language and culture of wine in Tuscany. Middlebury has partnered with industry professionals and the University of Florence to create a customized program designed for wine enthusiasts to gain knowledge and appreciation of this exceptional wine region.
Join us on this 10-day adventure, September 13–23, 2023. Deepen your knowledge of Italian wine, gain insider perspectives from local experts, and talk about wine in Italian as you immerse yourself in the beauty of Tuscany. You will meet the producers of Vino Nobile of Montepulciano, Chianti Classico, and Brunello of Montalcino and gain insights about the history, traditions, and modern innovations that have made Tuscany a wine lover’s paradise.
In this episode of Machiavelli in the Ivory Tower, hosts Sarah and Hanna speak with Rachel Whitlark, associate professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Their conversation focuses on Professor Whitlark’s 2021 book, All Options on the Table: Leaders, Preventive War, and Nuclear Proliferation, and what it reveals about the influence of leaders’ prior beliefs on their counterproliferation strategies once in office.
They begin with a discussion of the origins of this volume, where it fits within broader IR scholarship and the challenges and rewards of using archival material to understand leaders’ beliefs in retrospect. They then explore the relevance of Professor Whitlark’s central findings to other aspects of nuclear decision-making and contemporary nonproliferation challenges such as Iran’s evolving nuclear program.
At the end of their discussion, they reflect on the utility of scholarship to nuclear policymaking and ways to bridge the gap between the academic and practitioner communities. They conclude with some observations about less obvious but important ways scholars can shape policy, including by educating the next generation of decision-makers.
01:24 Introduction 01:49 ch 1. All Options on the Table: Leaders and Counterproliferation 05:54 ch 2. The Leader centric model and the first image 10:32 ch 3. Challenges and rewards of archival research 17:45 ch 4. Continuity and change in leaders’ beliefs 22:57 ch 5. Alternative hypotheses 31:50 ch 6. Iran’s nuclear program 35:20 ch 7. Leaders’ beliefs in other areas of nuclear decision-making 39:48 ch 8. Bridging the gap between scholarship and policy
The Middlebury Board of Trustees at their May meeting approved several important motions including faculty tenure and promotions, the 2024 budget, the public launch of the comprehensive campaign, start of construction on a new residence hall, and a new School Abroad in Taiwan. You can read more in the full news story.
Cortney Copeland MPA/MAIEM ’15, Max (Yaroslav’s son), Yaroslav Perepadya MACD ’03, and Ravi Dutta MPA ’09, one of several Institute alumni in the greater Sacramento area who welcomed the Ukrainian family to the U.S.
It wasn’t the email Yaroslav Perepadya had been hoping for.
Cortney Copeland MPA/MAIEM ’15 had bad news—the potential American sponsor for him and his teenage son hadn’t checked out.
It had been six months since Perepadya MACD ’03 and his son had fled their home in Dnipro, a day after Russia invaded at the border, just 150 miles from their home. They headed first to western Ukraine, then to Ireland, where they’d been hunkering down in a hotel room for months as Perepadya looked for a long-term home in the U.S.
Copeland, a board member and volunteer with the Returned Peace Corps Volunteers Alliance for Ukraine (RPCV Alliance), apologized for having gotten his hopes up and said they were still looking to see if they could find a match. As she scanned his bio, a detail jumped out at her.
She followed up to ask him where he completed his American master’s degree.
“The Middlebury Institute,” Perepadya wrote back.
“Me too!” said Copeland. Little did the two know where this serendipitous connection would take them.
Matchmaking: 70 Potential American Sponsors, 3,000 Ukrainians
When the war broke out in Ukraine, Copeland knew she had to act. She had served in the Peace Corps in Ukraine from 2017 to 2019 and was suddenly watching places she knew get bombed and getting messages from friends fleeing for their lives.
Cortney Copeland as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ukraine
“People who study at the Middlebury Institute want to be globally engaged person to person,” said Copeland.
The Returned Peace Corps Volunteers Alliance for Ukraine was trying to figure out how best to help when President Joe Biden announced Uniting for Ukraine, an unusual new program through which Americans could sponsor Ukrainians to come to the U.S. for a two-year period of humanitarian parole. The challenge? Not only did Ukrainians need to somehow know an American, but this person had to be willing to be financially responsible for them for two years.
“It requires Americans to be mini refugee resettlement agencies,” said Copeland.
They put out a call and got to work vetting 70 would-be American sponsors and trying to match them with some of the 3,000 Ukrainian individuals and families who filled out their interest forms.
It was triage. By necessity, they focused on sponsors who could pull it off and the families that would be a good match for them and most urgently needed the support.
“Being able to act is what keeps me sane, and I was able to act because I sit at the intersection of two powerful networks—people who believe in the global nature of our society and Peace Corps volunteers. This has allowed me to accomplish stuff I couldn’t have done by myself.”
The RPCV Alliance ultimately matched 22 cases, bringing about 46 Ukrainians to the U.S.
“It’s a drop,” said Copeland. “But it’s something.”
They’ve since merged the project with the nonprofit North America for Ukraine and have turned their focus to facilitating workshops for cross-cultural understanding between newly arrived Ukrainians and American sponsors—something Copeland studied at the Institute.
Life Rerouted by War
After studying for his college degree in Ukraine, Perepadya first came to the U.S. as an exchange student, thanks to a scholarship from the Department of State that took him to Clemson University in South Carolina. He followed this with an MA in commercial diplomacy at the Middlebury Institute in 2003.
Although most of his previous career was in operations and logistics, in 2017, Perepadya ended up taking his skills in a different direction as a regional project manager for a German governmental international development agency supporting humanitarian areas around the world. In this role, he supported the local self-government reform in Ukraine focused on decentralization of power from the central government to local authorities—an issue that Copeland also found herself working on as a Peace Corps volunteer.
Even so, when Russia invaded in early 2022, he struggled to believe it.
“It was so unimaginable that this could happen in the 21st century. The mind refused to believe it,” said Perepadya. “The morning it happened with fighter jets and bombings, me being a single dad, I knew we needed to relocate.”
Helping Other Ukrainians Settle in Sacramento
The volunteers with the RPCV Alliance heard story after story of need.
“We often bemoaned the fact that we couldn’t just sponsor everybody ourselves,” said Copeland, who became increasingly determined that if she found herself in a position to help someone she would do it.
Then she met Yaroslav, who was fluent in English and had a master’s degree, giving him a lot more career options than others might have. She conferred with her fellow volunteers and submitted the paperwork.
Just a few weeks later, Yaroslav and his son landed in California.
They were welcomed not only by Courtney but several other Institute alumni in the area who helped out with advice and networking.
Fortunately, his employer in Ukraine allowed him to keep doing his job remotely in his moves across the globe. Having settled in Davis, Perepadya identified the International Rescue Committee (IRC) as the main organization he wanted to work for here. In just a few months, he was hired on as a community integration program manager, managing federal and state grants supporting refugees arriving and settling in the Sacramento area.
“I’m excited and enthusiastic that the work is exactly what I want to do and fulfilling and where I can continue to support my fellow Ukrainians in ways that help them when they settle here,” said Perepadya.
There’s plenty of work to do as Sacramento is one of the top destinations for Ukrainians in the U.S. His team includes Americans, Ukrainians, and Afghans and is staffing up.
A few months into his new life here, his focus shifts between worrying about his family back home as he scans the daily headline and figuring out how to help the Ukrainians who have just arrived in the U.S.
“As humanitarian parolees, my son and I can’t leave the country and continue keeping our status, so we will not be able to see our family,” said Perepadya, whose elderly parents, sister, and two nieces are still in Ukraine. Also unknown is what will happen after the two years of the Uniting for Ukraine program end.
The IRC especially focuses on recent arrivals, helping them navigate the benefits, education, and healthcare systems.
“Every day I see the trials of the people who come to the U.S. and who aren’t so fortunate, who don’t speak English,” said Perepadya. “You can breathe when you aren’t worried about your everyday security for you and your kids, but you’re always thinking about family and friends in Ukraine. I try to keep busy and dive into the work.”
By popular demand, Tri-Valley Transit has reconfigured its weekday LINK to Burlington route to include midday travel options. The midday routing includes a stop at the University Mall before going to UVM Medical Center and the GMT Downtown Transportation Center.
You can use this bus to visit attractions, too. Rokeby Museum, Shelburne Museum and UVM Fleming Museum are all accessible. Fleming is open now while Rokeby and Shelburne reopen for the season in mid-May.
This is a zero-fare service (aka FREE TO RIDE). The first riders will receive a gift, while supplies last. Your ridership helps ensure that the service will continue – so don’t delay your plans, just grab a sweater and go.
Mental health problems don’t define who you are. They are something you experience. You walk in the rain and you feel the rain, but, importantly, you are not the rain.
– Matt Haig
Every year in May we celebrate mental health awareness. It’s a good time to have a conversation about mental health and the impact of mental health on our well-being. Everyone struggles with mental health challenges in their lifetime so if you are struggling, know that you are not alone. Connection and support can be instrumental in helping to move through the challenge with grace and kindness – some resources we have access to that can help.
InvestEAP: Free, confidential support, referrals and resources for employees and family members of Champlain, Middlebury and St. Michael’s to you and every member of your household. Click here for more information. You may call InvestEAP at 866-660-9533, 24/7 every day of the year.
Cigna Behavioral Health Programs: Whether you need help reducing stress, are feeling motivated to make a change in your life, or need someone to talk to, Cigna members are covered with virtual counseling, coaching and support and lifestyle management programs.
Balancing Your Financial & Emotional Well-being: Stress is something we all experience. Financial and emotional strains are both common, routinely appear together, and can significantly influence our lives. They are also something we all experience. Join the experts from MySecureAdvantage as they walk us through several financial and emotional challenges and offer tips on how to manage them. Tuesday, May 9th. This workshop being offered at noon and at 3pm EST. Click here to register for the noon session. Click here to register for the 3pm session.
Free Fresh Veggies! The Intervale Center will be offering free, fresh vegetable pickup on the third Friday of the month from 10am-6pmat the Intervale Center, 180 Intervale Road, Burlington. Registration is required. Friday, May 19. Sign up here.
Please join in on congratulating Dean Ouellette, Energy and Technology Manager in Facilities Services, who recently co-authored a new book that will be released soon. “Climb Every Mountain: 46 of the Northeast’s 111 Hikes over 4,000 feet” is a guidebook that offers detailed accounts on how tackle 46 mountain hikes in the Northeast. Dean and co-author Michele Hernandez Bayliss both have a passion for hiking and were able to find an effective, user-friendly way to share their knowledge of many points of the pre-hike preparation.
Each hike covered in the book includes a map, GPS coordinates, trailhead location, round-trip mileage, along with many other special fun facts like whether the trail is canine friendly, quality of the views and parking along with some photos.
Climb Every Mountain will be available online and in local Vermont shops, including the Vermont Book Shop here in downtown Middlebury and part of the “Vermont Author Series” talk at the Middlebury’s Ilsley Library on Tuesday, June 6, at 7 p.m.
