IPS – This Week @ MIIS

Alumnus Peter Evans: Applying Lessons from MIIS in High-Stakes Policy Debates

Bergthora Gudbergsdottir evag@miis.edu Alumni, CNS, Featured, IPS, newsroom, Nonproliferation August 28, 2014

“MIIS Match” Peter Evans and Fumio Evans Miyoshi, with their daughter, “a trilingual third-culture kid!”

When the Assad regime in Syria used chemical weapons against it citizens in the city of Ghouta in August of 2013, Peter Evans (MAIPS ’97) represented the Near East Affairs Bureau of the U.S. State Department’s nonproliferation policy office in the policy discussion of the response. “I applied all that I had learned at MIIS and during my internship at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague, and it positioned me to be on top of the topic from the start.”

Peter was first attracted to the Monterey Institute by the Translation and Interpretation program, but once he realized his language skills were not “that good,” he found that the Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) offered a great fit for his aspiration to work with the federal government. He was in the first class that was offered a certificate in nonproliferation studies in 1997. Right after graduation, his work with CNS and the internship with OPCW helped him “stand out amidst the crowd of job seekers,” and he joined the State Department as a civil servant in the nonproliferation policy office.

In his first ten years in Washington, Peter worked on UNSCOM weapons inspections and the Australia Group export control regime. Over time, his area of focus moved to military policy issues and he was appointed to a five-year commission in the Foreign Service, working in Jerusalem and Riyadh from 2008-2013. He is currently serving as the deputy director for Jordan and Lebanon in Washington, DC, but will soon be going overseas again as he has been approved for a mid-level conversion to the Foreign Service full time.

“MIIS graduates are everywhere,” Peter shares happily, noting that he has met classmates all around the world. He says MIIS prepared him perfectly for the career of his dreams. But best of all, while in Monterey he fell in love with and married his wife, Fumio (née) Miyoshi (MATI ’97). “Our 9-year old daughter is already a trilingual third-culture kid!”

Recommendation from MIIS Alumnus Leads to Transformative Internship

Bergthora Gudbergsdottir evag@miis.edu development, Featured, IPS, newsroom August 28, 2014

Michael Lui (MAIPS ’15) on the job at his summer internship working for the nonprofit organization Global Compassion in Cameroon.

For Michael Lui (MAIPS ’15), his summer internship working for the nonprofit organization Global Compassion in Cameroon was a transformative experience that he hopes to continue to build upon as he completes his degree in International Policy Studies, with a certificate in Conflict Resolution. For two and a half months Michael worked in the rural municipality of Santchou working on a grant proposal to implement a water project. His work involved researching existing wells and water taps, meeting with stakeholders, consulting with water experts and lots of writing.

The internship was exactly the missing piece Michael had been searching for. “I have always been amazed at the breadth of experience many of my fellow students bring to the class,” he shares, adding that he is a “California boy” who is really interested in conflict resolution as it relates to development issues, but before this summer had no experience working in a developing country. “It changes everything,” he says. Despite having studied poverty, development and conflict case studies for many years, he now says he finally understands what issues such as lack of access to potable water really mean.

Michael learned about the internship opportunity through the Center for Advising and Career Services. They in turn heard about it from recent alumnus Mohammed Makhlouf (MAIPS ’13), who had encouraged the president of Global Compassion to hire MIIS students and notified CACS staff of the position. Mohammed is a part of the very active international Monterey Institute alumni network.

Back in Monterey, where he has just started his third semester of studies, Michael has plans to build on his Cameroon experience as part of his class projects. His language of study is French, and during his time in Cameroon he says he was able to greatly improve his language skills. “Being able to talk to people in French really helped me a lot in my job because I was able to communicate directly and establish rapport with people.” Michael admits the experience was not without its challenges, but he learned a lot about himself and the field to which he aspires. “My main take away,” he says earnestly, is that “the world is full of opportunities and we have the ability to make a big difference if we do things right.”

Alumnus Garvey McIntosh Shoots for the Stars Working at NASA

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu Alumni, careers, Featured, IPS, newsroom July 2, 2014

Garvey McIntosh (MAIPS ’03) with Alumni Relations Director Leah Gowron (MPA ’97).

Garvey McIntosh (MAIPS ’03) came to the Monterey Institute of International Studies from Japan, where he had been teaching for four years. The inspiration for this move was actually his father, a retired college professor who had attended a conference at MIIS, and proclaimed that this was the “exact place” for him! As it turns out, his father was right—and in many ways still is, because Garvey has remained actively involved as an alumnus and is now one of the leaders of the revitalized Washington D.C. MIIS alumni chapter.

Garvey is among those MIIS graduates who really can claim two different sets of classmates. He certainly left his mark on campus, earning his master’s degree in International Policy Studies while serving as Student Council president and working in the President’s Office, where he had the opportunity to interact with faculty, staff and students from all corners of campus. “I saw it as my role in a way to improve relations among everyone,” Garvey says.

That knack for facilitating connections is one of Garvey’s greatest strengths and he has used it, along with his other skills, to catapult into a very rewarding career with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). While at MIIS, Garvey received a Center for Nonproliferation Studies fellowship to work for the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for close to a year and then he was off to Vietnam on a yearlong Boren fellowship. When he returned to complete his degree after two years away, he had the opportunity to gain a new set of classmates.

“I love my job,” Garvey says affably of his position as international programs specialist at NASA, noting that the majority of space and aeronautics missions today have an international component. He has traveled the world negotiating agreements on behalf of the U.S. government and NASA, and we can’t help but think that international scientific cooperation is in good hands.

For more stories from the current issue of the Communiqué newsletter, see the online edition.

MIIS Students Have “Eye-Opening” Experience on Spring Trip to Shanghai Free Trade Zone

Bergthora Gudbergsdottir evag@miis.edu Featured, IPS, MBA, newsroom, trade April 16, 2014

Professors Li Juan Zhang (seated, 2^nd from left) and Robert Rogowsky (seated, far right) with MIIS students and local hosts in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone.

Last fall, Professors Robert Rogowsky and Li Juan Zhang designed an immersive learning course to give Monterey Institute students the opportunity to experience first hand the real-world issues, impacts and policy implications of the Shanghai Free Trade Zone (FTZ). Fifteen students then joined them for a week-long trip to China over the March Spring Break, where they visited the Shanghai FTZ, met local policy makers, and learned from guest lectures by industry professionals and scholars. Students also had the opportunity to meet with faculty and students from Shanghai University of Finance and Economics and work with them.

Abdel K. Seck (MAIPS ‘13) calls the trip “a lifetime opportunity” because of the valueless amount of learning it offered him. Minnie Patnick (MBA/MAIPS ‘15) is especially grateful to her professors for organizing such an enriching experience filled with amazing site visits and “phenomenal” lectures. Like many graduate students, Haiben Ren (MAIPS ‘14) is focused on career opportunities and says that it was great to meet so many important people in the Shanghai FTZ, “where potential job positions are from in the future.” All of the students spoke of the importance of well-designed immersive learning opportunities, to put what they learn in the classroom into perspective, and to deepen their understanding of the issues they will face as professionals.

New Service-Learning Course Builds Community Partnerships through Hands-On Learning

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu Featured, IEM, IPS, MPA, newsroom, T&I, TESOL, TFL April 9, 2014

Lynn Bentaleb (MPA ’08), Kathryn Lattman (MAIEM ’14), Amitay Flores (MAIPS ’14), Molly McMills (MPA ’13), Maria Kovell (MPA ’14), Ali Philbrick (MAIEM ’14), and Natalie Cox (MPA ’14) at the Girls’ Health in Girls’ Hands Summit.

Monterey Institute students from the International Education Management, Public Administration, Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, Teaching a Foreign Language, and Translation and Interpretation degree programs are participating in a new course this semester, learning about program design while working with seven local organizations on projects that further each of their missions.

The new course, “Service-Learning: International and Domestic Community Partnerships,” was developed and taught by Professor Netta Avineri, who is passionate about civic engagement and prioritizes real world applications of her in-class lessons. The organizations are: Big Sur Charter School, Community Assessment of Monterey County, Girls’ Health in Girls’ Hands, International School of Monterey, Lyceum, National Steinbeck Center, and the YMCA. Student projects include website design, parent handbook and training development, educational video creation, leadership curriculum research, service-learning program development, grant writing, outreach, and tutor training handbook creation.

Alexandra (Ali) Philbrick (MAIEM ’14) and Kathryn Lattman (MAIEM ’15) have been working with the Girls’ Health in Girls’ Hands initiative this semester. Every year girls in Monterey County organize a summit with peer-taught sessions, which Ali and Kathryn attended and assisted with. They are working on a video to help the next group of girl organizers and also helping out with curriculum design, activities, and lessons, and doing research for a report.

“It could not be more perfect for me,” shares Ali, who will build on her experience working with local girls when she heads off to Peru for the practicum portion of her degree in the fall. In Peru, she will be working with the nonprofit organization Girlsportworks whose mission is to teach life skills to young women through athletics. “This is exactly what I want to be doing in the future,” she says. “Netta put a lot of thought into this,” says Kathryn appreciatively of the course, and adds that “you can’t beat the opportunity to learn by doing and do good at the same time by helping others.”

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine to Lecture on Russian Power Diplomacy at MIIS on March 24

Bergthora Gudbergsdottir evag@miis.edu Featured, IPS, newsroom, NPTS, trade March 21, 2014

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer will speak at the Monterey Institute on March 24.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer, currently director of the Arms Control and Non-Proliferation Initiative at the Brookings Institute, will give a public lecture on “Russian Power Diplomacy and Eurasian Intergration” in the Monterey Institute’s Irvine Auditorium at 5:00 p.m. on Monday, March 24.

Ambassador Pifer is a senior fellow with the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence and the Center on the United States and Europe in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. Pifer’s career as a foreign service officer centered on Europe, the former Soviet Union and arms control. Pifer also had postings in London, Moscow, Geneva and Warsaw, as well as on the National Security Council. At Brookings, Pifer focuses on arms control, Ukraine and Russia issues.

This lecture is free and open to the public, and is part of the Monterey Institute’s spring 2014 Colloquium on Economic Statecraft and Diplomacy.

MIIS Student Wins Projects for Peace Fellowship for Cholera Prevention Project in Haiti

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu development, Featured, Fellowships, internships, IPS, newsroom, social_change March 19, 2014

Wesley Laine (MAIPS ’14) holding one of the beneficiaries of his innovative water project.

Monterey Institute student Wesley Laine (MAIPS ’14) will receive $10,000 in funding for his Cholera prevention project in Haiti through the prestigious Projects for Peace fellowship. “I am really grateful to MIIS and the Kathryn Davis Foundation for believing in my project — Cholera Prevention: Service, Solidarity, and Peace,” says Wesley. The foundation’s Projects for Peace initiative encourages students at the Davis United World College Scholars Program partner schools to design grassroots projects that promote peace and address the root causes of conflict among parties. The fellowship is funded by the Davis family in honor of Kathryn W. Davis, a lifetime internationalist and philanthropist, who died last year at the age of 106. She founded the program when she turned 100 years old, challenging young leaders to “bring about a mind-set of preparing for peace, instead of preparing for war.”

Wesley is very passionate about his bottom-up approach to form a real partnership with people in rural Haiti to improve hygiene with the aim of preventing waterborne pathogens, especially cholera. His work has been featured at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting (see news story from October 2013). He likens the project to a marathon and says: “I am in it until the end. That is my promise to my compatriots in Haiti.”

Applicants for Projects for Peace fellowships are encouraged to use their creativity to design projects and employ innovative techniques for engaging project participants in ways that focus on conflict resolution, reconciliation, building understanding and breaking down barriers which cause conflict, and finding solutions for resolving conflicts and maintaining peace. Wesley has designed his project to “empower the individual agency with a focus on establishing a preferential option for the poor.” He is very happy with the many professional growth opportunities he has been provided with through his studies at the Monterey Institute, including a semester in Paris with Middlebury Schools Abroad and Development Project Management Institute intensive training program in Rwanda this January.

MIIS Team Reaches Finals of Regional Hult Prize Competition, Makes Key Connections

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu development, DPMI, Featured, FMS, IPS, MPA, newsroom, social_change March 14, 2014

From left: Maria Kovell (MPA ‘14), Amitay Flores (IPS ‘14), Amanda Boyek (IPS ‘14), Natalie Cox (MPA ‘14), Amy Ross (MPA ‘14)

A team of Monterey Institute students—Maria Kovell (MPA ‘14), Amitay Flores (MAIPS ‘14), Amanda Boyek (MAIPS ‘14), Natalie Cox (MPA ‘14), and Amy Ross (MPA ‘14)—made their mark at the Hult Prize regional competition last weekend in San Francisco, and left the competition with something at least as good as a win: a path forward for their innovative project.

The team first beat hundreds of competitors to win a place in the 2014 Hult Prize Regional Finals in San Francisco, then proceeded to wow the judges there, who selected them as one of four teams (out of 47) to advance to the final round of the regional competition. The other three finalists came from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the Hult International Business School in San Francisco, and the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

The 2014 Hult Prize Challenge, a collaboration with the Clinton Global Initiative, was to design a sustainable business model addressing non-communicable disease in urban slums. Executives from Intel, IDEO, Google.org, EMC and Matternet were represented on the judging panel that supported the Monterey Institute team and voted them into the final round. The team was encouraged by the reception their idea received and plan to move their venture, Salud2, forward after graduation in May with a pilot in Mexico. They will be meeting with people from some of the organizations they connected with at the competition and are also exploring options with MIIS faculty and staff.

“It was an energizing experience for us. MIIS coursework and programs like the Frontier Market Scouts (FMS) and the Development Project Management Institute (DPMI) opened our minds and pushed our thinking to the level required to tackle today’s most complex problems,” says Amy Ross. The team sincerely thanks the MIIS faculty that supported them along the way and would like to congratulate the MIT team that moved forward from the San Francisco Regional Finals and will present their venture at the Clinton Global Initiative in September.

Class Transforms MIIS Student’s Concept of International Development, Opens Up Career Opportunities

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu abroad, development, dream-career, FMS, IPS, newsroom February 21, 2014

Xiao’ou Zhu (MAIPS ’14) in Sri Lanka on her Frontier Market Scouts field assignment.

Xiao’ou Zhu (MAIPS ’14) says she has always been interested in international development work, but that she had a very narrow view of what that meant until she came to the Monterey Institute. Her view before could best be described as a “brick and mortar” view of development involving official development assistance (ODA) and infrastructure support. That all changed when she took Professor Nukhet Kardam’s Development Theory and Practice class; “it opened a window into the possibilities of international development,” says Xiao’ou.

“For me the most interesting lessons were connected to sustainability and the importance of community involvement,” says Xiao’ou, who along with two other students from the Development Practice and Policy program, Sarah White (MAIPS ’13) and Abdul Khabir Mirzakhail (MPA ’14), worked on a proposal for a small-scale irrigation project in Ethiopia for a non-governmental organization. “It was a perfect team,” Xiao’ou says happily, explaining that they each brought different expertise and experience to a project they all believed to be applicable to their future careers.

More recently, when Xiao’ou applied for a very competitive internship at the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture, she included their paper as a sample of her work. “I was thrilled when they contacted me and said they were very impressed with the paper!” She was offered a management role in a World Bank agriculture project in China but could not accept, as it would have meant a six-month commitment and she wanted to complete her studies at MIIS. Instead, she decided to join the Frontier Market Scouts program and work on a summer project in Sri Lanka.

Xiao’ou’s decision to decline the internship surprised officials in the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture, but they continued to be interested in her work and contracted her to work on a research project for them while in Sri Lanka. “So I ended up with two simultaneous internships!” Xiao says, adding that she is working on the deliverables for the ministry as part of a directed study with Professor Wei Liang.

Peru Practicum: Breaking Down Barriers Between Classroom and Real-World Development

Anne-Marie Steiger asteiger@miis.edu Alumni, development, Featured, IPS, MPA, newsroom, research February 21, 2014

Aaron Ebner (center, MPA ’11), co-founder of the Andean Alliance for Sustainable Development, with MIIS students in Peru

Five MIIS professors took an introductory policy analysis course and turned it into an optional year-long immersive learning opportunity. Students have the option to enroll in a Peru-focused policy class in the fall, design a research project, conduct in-field research as part of a winter-term practicum in Peru, and then follow up by working with the information and data collected as part of a seminar in the spring, all while they are learning the tools of data analysis.

Linking faculty research, alumni activities, and students’ desire for practical learning experiences, this is a true MIIS community collaboration. It started with Professors Robert McCleery and Philip Murphy, who have been working on research on the links between poverty and isolation, and grew through connections with the Andean Alliance for Sustainable Development, a non-profit co-founded by alumni Aaron Ebner (MPA ’11) and Adam Stieglitz (MPA ’11) that is working on community development projects in the isolated Sacred Valley of Peru.

Professor Jeff Dayton-Johnson and his team of 25 International Policy Studies, Master of Public Administration, Master of Business Administration and International Education Management students looked at several dimensions of connectivity as it relates to a poor rural economy like that of Andean Peru. That included roads, telecommunications, connectivity to public services like health care and education, and connectivity via language (while the national language of Peru is Spanish, Quechua is the language spoken by most of the people in the study area).

Five students—Mario Guzmán-Soria, Josefina Lara, Luz Vázquez Ramos, Ximena Ospina, and Rafael Hernández—presented a preliminary report on major themes and initial findings to local authorities in Calca before returning to Monterey. Says Professor Dayton-Johnson about the experience: “This student-organized and delivered presentation in Calca effectively breaks down the barriers between the classroom and the real world of development practice. Our students took advantage of this opportunity to share initial findings from a field research project they had designed and carried out, to respond to policy makers’ questions, and to strengthen the relationship between MIIS and this region of Peru. I’m very proud of them and look forward to building on their work with another group of students next J-Term!”