Communique Summer 2016

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO APRIL 4 With stops at Guantanamo, clown school, MIIS.

THIS IS NOT A DRILL 8 MIIS research and off-shore oil drilling.

Communiqué SUMMER 2016

Germs of War

Raymond Zilinskas has spent a career thinking about the most nefarious weapons. PAGE 6

THE VIEW FROM SEGAL

FIVE MINUTES WITH PROFESSOR NÜKET KARDAM

The Mission of MIIS—in Action

T Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Institute Jeff Dayton-Johnson.

he phr ase “mission-driven organization” should give you pause—while plenty of organizations are eager to present themselves in an altruistic light, few actually deliver on that promise. We work hard to put our mission into action at the Institute.

Through programs such as Frontier Market Scouts and Ambassador Corps, our Center for Social Impact Learning trains and supports students who identify budding entrepreneurs in developing economies and connect them with the capital they need in order to scale up their businesses. These programs draw on the Institute’s expertise in areas including business, development, language, and intercultural communication to create tangible social impact, spurring economic growth and changing lives in the process.

Programs like these also offer our students the opportunity to make a difference before they even graduate.

Real-world, hands-on experiential learning is a fundamental part of our organizational character and identity. Our students don’t sit in a classroom sketching out a business plan for an imaginary sustainable business; they go to Kenya or Peru or India—and to Silicon Valley and Singapore—where they work with real-life local entrepreneurs.

Our spring Commencement speaker, Sakena Yacoobi, who is a member of

Reflections on a Native Land

the Center for Social Impact Learning’s advisory council, has said, “I really believe that students today, like those at the Institute, are going to be the ones who make the world a better place.” Sakena founded the Afghan Institute of Learning (ail) in 1995 to provide training, education, and health care to the Afghan people, with a particular focus on women and children. In the process of living out its organizational mission, ail has grown into one of the largest nonprofit organizations in Afghanistan, providing education and health-care services for more than 12 million people. In 2005, Sakena was among a large group of remarkable women leaders who were jointly nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Sakena’s story epitomizes the hopes and dreams of many of the Institute’s students, alumni, faculty, and staff. We want to do meaningful work that has a positive impact on the world around us.

Whether we work in a comfortable office in a city or a simple clinic at the end of a dirt road thousands of miles from Monterey, we want our work to matter—and that’s why leaders like Sakena Yacoobi are often drawn to Monterey. We understand one another in a profound and fundamental way. The missions of our organizations aren’t just empty slogans to be filed away until the next annual report—they are authentic representations of how we want to spend our lives. n

Whether we work in a comfortable office in a city or a simple clinic at the end of a dirt road thousands of miles from Monterey, we want our work to matter.

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COVER PHOTO OF MARBURG VIRUS FROM GETTY IMAGES

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ABOVE PHOTO BY BRIDGET BESAW

Middlebury Institute Professor Nükhet Kardam was born in Ankara and raised in Istanbul. Like many Turks, she has grappled with shifting and conflicting concepts of national identity and the relationship between Islam and the West. Kardam now divides her time between Turkey and Monterey and shares with us her thoughts on her native country today.

When I think of Turkey, I see a vibrant and paradoxical country. When I first left home in 1978 very few people knew about the country or seemed at all interested in it. I felt defensive about being from Turkey. I had no idea I was from a developing country until I was treated that way. Now people say, “Oh, I have been there and want to go back!” Tourism has changed many things, but I’m not sure it has necessarily increased understanding. I’m proud to be Turkish, but I’m also apprehensive about where the country is headed.

Ottomans became Turks overnight. Ataturk allied with the Kurds in the Independence War but went back on his promises for greater autonomy. Everyone was to shed their former identities and become a part of the new homogenous state. If you wonder why the Middle East is such a mess, it is because there is a power vacuum and identities are being manipulated by politics.

It has become difficult to have political discussions in Turkey. Some people are afraid of the rise of Islamic tendencies; others are against totalitarianism. They have a hard time talking to each other. For many, the challenge is whether there will be continued space for diversity in Turkey.

ILLUSTRATION BY CATH RILEY

Like most Turkish liberals, I supported the AK Party when it first came to power.

The party gave rise to a new middle class that has, in many ways, replaced the secular elites. Under the party’s rule, health services, infrastructure spending, and social security have expanded enormously.

Erdogan said democracy is like a bus and that we would get off when we no longer needed it. That is now happening. The opposition is paralyzed by infighting.

In some ways, history is repeating itself.

My grandfather worked for the Quarantine Service, whose objective was to prevent infectious diseases from entering the Ottoman Empire and being passed on to Europe. It also accepted refugees from Eastern Europe and Greece. As those lands were lost, the Muslim subjects who lived there were persecuted and had to flee. Now Turkey has made a deal to prevent the passage of refugees into the EU. My book From Ottoman to Turk and Beyond: Shimmering Threads of Identity has been translated into Turkish; this summer I’m presenting at a conference in Istanbul about Turkish-American identity.

There are now enough of us to start collectively exploring what it really means to be Turkish American. n

Secularism should bring with it a division between church and state but in Turkey it has meant state-controlled religion. What this means is that a particular version of Sunni-Islam is privileged. Other religious groups become invisible.

Several years ago when I felt completely comfortable in my adopted country, I started feeling really homesick for Turkey. Questions about my identity and the meaning of life led me to research my family history. Dr. Kilsli Rifat, my grandfather who gave me my name, was a recognized scholar, doctor, and author in the last years of the Ottoman Empire and through the infancy of modern Turkey.

Following the threads of his story became a larger exploration about what it means to be Turkish, to be me.

Summer 2016 3

WHAT I’VE LEARNED Humor. We all laugh. Make space for that. Participating in theater in high school was a great outlet. I learned to never take myself too seriously. That is probably why I ended up at the Clown Conservatory in San Francisco.

Life is not a zero-sum game. Most hate and misunderstanding stems from fear or when people feel threatened. There is no script for life. The more we can be comfortable with that, the less scary the unknown seems.

beautiful stretch of land surrounded by crystal clear water. It is so idyllic, in fact, that you easily forget you are under constant surveillance and surrounded by landmines. One day I would love to visit real Cuba.

Life lessons from being a clown. Funny enough, the skills I gained in my yearlong program have been more relevant to my life than almost any other experience.

Seriously. Knowing how to engage and respond to an audience, as well as how to turn my weaknesses into “golden opportunities” (to quote my clown teacher), continue to inform my daily interactions.

Theater of the Oppressed is a concept created by Brazilian activist Augusto Boal in the 1970s. The idea has spread across the world and is used as a participatory action tool to encourage collective problem solving and discourse around social injustices. Boal’s techniques compliment what we are studying here at the Institute, and I was grateful to host a workshop with expert facilitators this semester.

So many great activities start with s.

Since my husband and I are both busy graduate students, we decided to limit our activities to those that start with the letter s, such as swimming, surfing, sailing, studying, suppering…and other things you can use your imagination to figure out. I recently started aerial silks with a friend. The plan is to be able to hang silks from our boat and do private performances over the ocean.

If you don’t have it, create it. The small high school I attended in Guantanamo Bay did not have a theater program so we created it. In my liberal arts college, I learned that my education is my education and designed my own degree blending biology, psychology, and theater. In my first semester at the Institute I wanted to find ways to apply my Spanish in real life so I collaborated with my Spanish professor, Gabriel Guillen, to launch a tandem language course that partners with language learners in the community.

Love. I have never lived anywhere for more than three years in a row, so home is not a geographical location. Home is what I feel when I am around certain people. Home is warm breezes and the open ocean. Home is peanut butter and banana sandwiches.

My husband and I met in Nepal, where we both worked as volunteer English teachers. We were initially just friends but kept in touch over the years and fell in love when we reconnected in California. It was a big decision for me to give up my dream of being a starving clown and follow him to Hawaii with his military career. More than ten years later, the risk has paid off. I never could have predicted the ways my life has unfolded, yet at the same time I can’t imagine it any other way.

As the Alchemist says, “The universe conspires…” n

Irrational fear of clowns or coulrophobia is, in part, connected to the exaggerated painted faces of American-style clowns.

This style evolved when circuses like Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey moved to big, multiring arenas so that audience members in the back could see their facial expressions. If you are entertaining at a child’s birthday party, you do not need such embellishments.

APRIL DANYLUK

The World According to April

A

pril danyluk maiem/mpa ’16 lives on a sailboat in the Monterey marina. She attended high school in Guantanamo Bay, is a graduate of the Clown Conservatory in San Francisco, and has lived and worked all over the world. In her time at the Institute, she has cofounded a program that connects miis students who are learning Spanish with Hispanic women in Soledad who are learning English, and has brought the Theater of the Oppressed to Monterey. This is what she’s learned along the way.

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At 36, I am considered an older student.

As you get older you realize that no one really knows what they are doing in life and we are all figuring it out as we go.

This realization makes me more relaxed about it all and, in many ways, more present to enjoy the journey.

Living simply is liberating. My husband and I sold most of our stuff and bought a sailboat and have made it our home in the Monterey harbor for the last two years. A roof over your head, a laptop, and a jacket go a long way in Monterey.

I prefer being part of the crew. If I trust the leadership I have found that I don’t need to always be in control. I can if I have to, but I prefer to remain adaptable and agile to all the roles life throws at me.

Talk to strangers. So many times things could have gone badly but didn’t because I asked for help and got it. Traveling around the world I have found that most people are good, willing to help you, and appreciate human interaction. Talking to strangers also gives you a lot of opportunity to listen and learn.

PHOTO BY ELENA ZHUKOVA

Clowns, with humor as their medium, demonstrate our universal human absurdities, insecurities, and contradictions. I strongly believe that the role of clowns in our society—in any society—is profoundly important. They can be inappropriate and histrionic in a way that is cathartic to a rule-abiding audience.

Sure, they make us laugh. But they also help us see ourselves for who we really are: ridiculous creatures.

I have never been to real Cuba. My dad was stationed in Guantanamo before 9/11, and I have fond memories of my two years there. It is a very small and intimate community with one road, one store, and one McDonald’s. It is an amazingly

Most hate and misunderstanding stems from fear or when people feel threatened. There is no script for life. The more we can be comfortable with that, the less scary the unknown seems.

Summer 2016 5

Q&A

A Conversation with Raymond Zilinskas On the Cold War, Iraq, and biological warefare.

Q: You have spent much of your career researching and analyzing some of world’s most nefarious chemical and biological weapons programs. What sparked your interest in this subject?

A: I had been working as a clinical microbiologist since earning my master’s degree in organic chemistry from the University of Stockholm and felt that my career had flattened out. At the time there was a lot of controversy surrounding dna manipulation, and I was interested in the area where microbiological science meets policy and ethics. My dissertation explored issues generated by recombinant dna research, including the applicability of genetic engineering techniques to biological weapons development.

Q: After

Desert Storm ended, you served as a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq in 1994. Did your findings in any way match the claims later made to justify United States military actions a decade later?

A: As a member of two United Nations Special Commission inspections, we went to all 82 biological institutes in the country, recorded dual-use equipment, and interviewed scientists. When I was in

Iraq, its government still was lying about not having had a biological weapons program. So we were meeting lots of resistance when interviewing anyone. After my stay with unscom was over, the situation changed because Hussein Kamel defected in August 1995 and informed unscom about the Iraqi biological weapons program. Although Iraq was still holding back information about its program by the time that unscom departed from Iraq in December 1998, unscom findings had confirmed that Iraq’s chemical and biological weapons programs were defunct. In February 2003, I watched Colin Powell’s presentation to the U.N. Security Council at home and immediately knew that parts of it did not make sense. He should never have done it. It appears that he trusted the briefings he received from the cia, but for unknown reasons did not consult with State Department experts who had been unscom inspectors, and he also appears not to have had access to critical voices from within the Agency.

Q: Most

of what we now know about the Soviet biological weapons program from its inception in the 1920s comes from the research you and Milton Leitenberg conducted for your book The Soviet Biological Weapons Program: A History

(Harvard University Press, 2012). What surprised you most?

A:

The first defector to provide inside information about the civilian elements of the program (called Biopreparat) fled to London in 1989. We gained even more insight three years later when Dr. Kanatjan Alibekov, the second in command of the Biopreparat program defected. That same year, Yeltsin admitted that it existed in violation of the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. So we knew that the Soviet biological weapons program was big. But I was surprised to learn how large it had been and how many thousands of people had been working on it.

Milton and I spent eleven years researching this book, and a lot of our information came from former Soviet weapons scientists. After the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, many of the best ones had emigrated to the United Kingdom and Israel, and Congress had a program in the 1990s that made it easy for a select number of them to come to the United States.

Q: What

has become of the Soviet biological weapons program in Putin’s Russia?

A:

Truthfully, we don’t know. Russia now officially denies a biological weapons program ever existed, but there is no transparency and there is a lot that nobody outside Russia knows about. I am actually currently working on a book about the Putin administration’s views on biological security. It does not have a title yet, but in it I will try to make sense of Putin’s

puzzling activities related to the biosciences. On one hand, he has been reaching out to international organizations and promoting collaborations like the one between mit and Skoltech. On the other hand, military and anti-plague institutions are completely closed to the outside world. One of Putin’s pre-election promises in 2012 was to develop weapons based on high technologies, including genetics.

He now claims that it is a defense program, but that was not what he said then.

Q: You

served as technical advisor on the most recent season of the acclaimed series The Americans. Are you happy with the outcome?

A:

So far everything pertaining to microbiology has been technically correct.

They have used many of my suggestions, both in relation to plausible plot lines and procedures. I enjoyed working with the writers, and they frequently called with more technical questions that I was happy to answer. They also took into consideration the historical accuracy I was able to provide about the Soviet program and the U.S. biodefense program (the U.S. terminated its biological weapons program in 1969). When I visited the set in New York, I met the episode’s director Daniel Sackheim and leading lady Keri Russell and saw the great care that show runners put into details and getting important facts right.

Q: It is safe to say that your field of ex-

pertise sounds scary to most of us. Is there anything that keeps you up at night?

A:

So we knew that the Soviet biological weapons program was big. But I was surprised to learn how large it had been and how many thousands of people had been working on it.

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I strongly believe that if we can prepare ourselves to guard against natural diseases then we can better respond to deliberate attacks. We don’t really know what the threat is, and therefore we have to be prepared for anything that nature challenges us with, particularly emerging and exotic infectious diseases. n

PHOTO BY ELENA ZHUKOVA

RAYMOND ZILINSKAS

Raymond A. Zilinskas Job Title Director, Chemical and Biological Weapons Nonproliferation Program; Research Professor, Graduate School of International Policy and Management areas of research Achieving effective international biological arms control; proliferation potential of the former Soviet Union’s biological warfare program; meeting the threat of bioterrorism; improving preparedness and response capabilities of local and state health departments Photo features a Soviet-issued biological weapons suit from Zilinskas’ personal collection.

Summer 2016 7

Without a Road Map

Caption goes here and there once we have the center student’s name in this photo.

A cohort of students test drive a new curricular approach.

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he concept behind the “Sprintensive” pilot project is deceptively simple: instead of juggling four classes during the semester, 30 students enrolled in one class that met four hours a day, five days a week. After covering a full course’s worth of material in just three weeks, the same group then repeated the process three more times, one course at a time; after 15 weeks they had completed a full semester’s curriculum. (During this initial pilot, Sprintensive was offered only within the Development Practice and Policy program, and only for one four-course block.)

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Students were drawn to the project for various reasons. Melissa Hewitt maipd ’17 says she liked the idea of concentrating on just one subject at a time and doing so with a group of people she’d get to know well. Oumar Amar maipd ’17, an international student from Mauritania, says he specifically wanted to take two courses—Organizational Sustainability and Network Analysis—in the intensive format. And Andrew Larson mpa ’17 says that he was particularly drawn to the group dynamic and the way such an experience could mimic future professional interaction.

The three students also acknowledged potential downsides, including the isolating effects of working with the same class of 30 students for an entire semester and the challenges of constantly working in small groups—not always with compatible partners. All three ended up feeling they learned valuable lessons while navigating these challenges, though. “It’s a good experience that will prepare us well for the real world,” said Amar, “because in the workplace you will have to deal with people from different cultures, with different perspectives about things, and you won’t have a choice about whether to

PHOTO BY ELENA ZHUKOVA

work with them.” Program Coordinator Galen Anderson maiem/mpa ’15 added, “As a professional, you’re going to work with people you don’t necessarily like and you’re going to have to find strategies to accomplish a lot under deadlines. We’re trying to represent that workplace reality.”

By the end of the semester, Hewitt was also acutely aware of the differences between the styles and tempos of the four participating professors. “The units all have different feels as classes; it got intense in the second and third units.

Teachers’ personalities really come out in a three-week intensive course.” Hewitt also noted that she missed the chance for “cross-learning” between subjects being studied simultaneously. Opinions were mixed on the effectiveness of an effort to weave together the four courses’ themes via a semester-long project around the theme of sustainability. “Since most of us were treating it as a side project,” said ???, “it seemed like most of the professors saw it in the same way. It wasn’t really well-integrated into the program.”

The concept behind Sprintensive originated with the Institute’s development and social change certificate program known as dpmi (Design, Partnering, Management and Innovation). The pilot project, codirected by dpmi founder Professor Beryl Levinger and Associate Provost Amy McGill, essentially applies dpmi’s modular curriculum design and intensive three-week schedule to a set of four courses. Participating faculty this spring included Levinger, Alfredo Ortiz, Fernando de Paolis, and Phil Murphy. The team plans to use the feedback gained through a thorough evaluation process to enhance the project’s second outing in spring 2017.

“I think Sprintensive should be offered as an option,” says Amar, “especially for students in their third semester. By then, students have already taken different subjects and can really contribute to discussions.” Larson believes “it’s a rewarding program. I think the planning team should focus on which classes to include, because that made a huge difference. These specific classes worked really well together.” n

NUMBERS

spring commencement

at the Institute is always

a splendid affair. A sun-dappled Colton Hall Lawn hosts a gathering of 1,400 on a day when achievements are celebrated and agents of change are sent out into the world.

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Number of students each from Astana, Kazakhstan; Baghdad, Iraq; Caracas, Venezuela; Iloilo City, Philippines; Kolkata, India; Prishtina, Kosovo; and Rexburg, Idaho

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Certificates awarded

29

Homelands represented in the graduating class

266

Master’s degrees awarded

1,700 1849

Chairs set up on Colton Hall Lawn to accommodate graduates, family members, faculty, staff, alumni, and guests

Year California’s Constitutional Convention was held in Colton Hall

12,000,000

Afghan citizens served by the Afghan Institute of Learning founded by Commencement speaker Sakena Yacoobi

Summer 2016 9

It’s Not As Simple As…

A glass of milk might seem like a simple thing until you take a moment to consider everything that goes into producing it: land, cows, barns, milking, pasteurizing, bottling, labeling, refrigeration, distribution, and so on. We’ve asked a new lineup of faculty advisors to explain to us why some of the topics they’re studying and talking about aren’t as simple as they might appear on first glance.

Are CEOs paid too much? It’s not as simple as just looking at that fat paycheck. The question we need to ask is whether they earned their compensation, that is: were ceos paid for performance? Equally important, however, is the issue of what constitutes performance. Studies show that if you aren’t treating your shareholders fairly, you probably aren’t dealing correctly with your other stakeholders either! —Sandra M. Dow, Professor and Program Chair, Fisher MBA in Global Impact Management It’s not as simple as you might imagine to estimate the true impact of Sea Level Rise (slr) and climate change. We’re analyzing these economic and social impacts by combining information about the location of economic activities and critical infrastructure with residential location and geographic characteristics to build an srl Vulnerability Index. Working with other experts, policy makers, and community leaders, we’re developing ways to help communities everywhere prepare for the new challenges. —Fernando de Paolis, Associate Professor, International Policy and Development, Public Administration

It’s not as simple as it it might seem to have a book, website, or mobile app localized into other languages. Each product requires a specialized team of engineers, layout editors, translators, proof readers, reviewers, and testers to make sure the translations display correctly. Managing these teams requires a project manager who hires each person, decides how much time each has, designs the processes each will follow, resolves problems that come up, and works with the client to make sure the final product will meet the specifications. —Max Troyer, Assistant Professor and Program Coordinator, Translation and Localization Management It’s not as simple as “training language teachers.” Being a publicly engaged applied linguistics educator, researcher, and practitioner involves collaboration—facilitating students’ development of language-teaching philosophies connected to their pedagogical practices, publishing and presenting in diverse venues with interdisciplinary language and social justice scholars, teaching critical service-learning courses with community partners, collectively shaping a vision for intercultural studies, and engaging in research on “heritage narratives” with immigrant communities. —Netta Avineri, Visiting Professor, Graduate School of Translation, Interpretation, and Language Education It’s not as simple as packing a suitcase. We pursue international education by offering programs focused on building global awareness and cultural understanding. We create shared understanding in a world that often exploits difference. It starts and ends with unpacking—understanding nuanced cultural customs, history, power, privilege, and identity. Our work begins long before the suitcase is needed.

—Paige Butler, Assistant Professor, International Education Management In this day and age, it’s not as simple as “just teaching Arabic.”

We design a rigorous Arabic curriculum that encourages students to be creative and think critically, and provides them with opportunities to discuss current issues that are relevant to their courses of study. While course content reflects the existence of different world views, we tend to focus on the properties that bind us all together in one world. —Mahmoud Abdalla, Associate Professor, Arabic Language Studies n

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ILLUSTRATION BY ROBERT NEUBECKER

This Is Not a Drill

MIIS research influences conversation on offshore oil drilling.

O

ne of the primary goals of the Institute’s Center for the Blue Economy (cbe) is “to provide data and analysis that becomes part of the policy conversation,” says cbe Director Jason Scorse. A policy reversal by the Obama Administration this spring illustrated how relevant, timely data and research can have an impact on policy decisions.

Opening the Atlantic to offshore drilling has been debated since the 1970s Arab oil embargo. An industry-commissioned 2013 report by Quest Offshore Resources estimated that offshore drilling could generate nearly 280,000 jobs and up to $23.5 billion a year in economic activity by 2035. A year later, Administration officials released the first draft of a new five-year offshore development plan that proposed exploration and drilling leases off the southeast Atlantic Coast.

In 2015, the Southern Environmental Law Center asked the cbe to review the Quest study and describe economic activity that could be affected by offshore drilling. The cbe analysis identified flaws in the job estimates and disputed Quest’s estimate of billions of dollars in revenue sharing for states. It pointed out that Congress has refused to share oil and gas royalties with states outside the Gulf of Mexico for the past 40 years, and that declining oil prices would significantly reduce exploratory activity, and therefore its economic impact, below

Quest’s estimates. Using detailed economic data from the cbe-based National Ocean Economics Program, the new report also highlighted the potential negative impact of an oil spill on a vibrant $15 billion a year ocean-based economy in a region built primarily on tourism and fisheries.

In March, the Administration released its final five-year plan, which no longer includes opening the South Atlantic to offshore oil drilling. Subsequent media reports in the Washington Post, Miami Herald, and several newspapers in the Southeast cited the cbe report’s findings as a factor in federal officials’ abrupt reversal on offshore drilling. DailyKos noted that the cbe report found that elements of the Quest study touting the benefits of offshore drilling were “based on outdated assumptions, including leases based on oil trading at $120 a barrel in 2018. It is currently trading below $40 a barrel. When projected economic benefits were weighed against potential damage, the cbe report found that the states where off-shore drilling would have been allowed might gain little to nothing.”

“The data we uncovered spoke for itself—I’m just glad people in the Administration were listening,” says Scorse. “It’s important for policymakers at all levels to understand the bigger picture when it comes to ensuring a healthy, vital ocean and coastal economy.” n

“It’s important for policymakers at all levels to understand the bigger picture when it comes to ensuring a healthy, vital ocean and coastal economy.”

timeline FEBRUARY 2010 Governors in the South Atlantic states notify the Department of the Interior that they would like leasing of federal lands for oil exploration to be considered in the next five-year plan.

MAY 2010 The Deepwater Horizon oil spill gushes for 87 days, the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry.

DECEMBER 2013 Quest Offshore Resources prepares a study for the American Petroleum Institute and National Ocean Industries Association predicting that opening the Atlantic outer continental shelf to oil and natural gas exploration could produce 1.3 million barrels of oil per day, and generate several hundred thousand jobs and up to $23.5 billion a year in economic and tax revenue impacts by 2035.

JANUARY 2015 The Obama Administration announces a draft five-year plan that would allow offshore oil drilling off the southeastern Atlantic seaboard.

DECEMBER 2015 The Center for the Blue Economy prepares a report for the Southern Environmental Law Center that disputes Quest’s job and revenue estimates, points out that declining oil prices undermine the Quest report’s findings regarding economic impact, and highlights the risk of an oil spill damaging the coastal economy.

MARCH 2016 The Obama Administration releases the final draft five-year plan, which no longer includes plans for offshore oil drilling in the South Atlantic.

Summer 2016 11

IN BRIEF

recent news from members of the monterey community and around the world.

SIGHTINGS ›› Diplomats

from the United States and Russia—including U.S. Under Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov— met at the Institute in April for a workshop focused on tensions on the Korean Peninsula. The workshop was cohosted by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (cns) and its Russian partner, the Center for Energy and Security Studies, and convened by cns founder/ director William Potter.

Participants included Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Executive Secretary Lassina Zerbo, former U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry, and California Governor Jerry Brown. “I believe this dialogue contributed to a better understanding of the nuclear and security challenges on the Korean Peninsula,” said Potter.

“It also demonstrated that nonproliferation is an area in which the United States and Russian share significant common interests.” ›› Ten

students traveled to Bhutan over spring break to engage with community leaders and local citizens and experience firsthand the Himalayan nation’s commitment to a political philosophy based on “Gross

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National Happiness.” Students spent nine days in country on the trip, which was organized

by Professor Jan Black and staff member Carolyn Taylor Meyer maips ‘05 in partnership with the Royal Thimpu College of Bhutan.

Students enjoyed lectures organized by community leaders before traveling to the remote Phobjikha Valley, where they stayed with local farmers. On their last day, the group hiked to the famous Tiger’s Nest, a monastery perched high up on a cliff.

Each student subsequently completed an individual research project tailored to fit their degree program. ›› Students and faculty

discussed the ocean and fishery protection provisions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (tpp) with U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and Congressman Sam Farr at an invitationonly February 16 roundtable.

Hosted by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute at its Moss Landing headquarters, the event included Ambassador Froman, Congressman Farr, local business and environmental leaders, aquarium staff, and two faculty members and three students from the Middlebury Institute: Dr. Michael McGinnis of the International Environmental

Policy program and the Center for the Blue Economy, Dr. Robert Rogowsky, chair of the International Trade and Economic Policy program, and students Chris Watson maited ’16, Sorina Seeley maip ’17, and Shaun Richards maip ’17.

PRESENTATIONS ›› Longtime

faculty member and Institute tesol program founder Kathi Bailey was inaugurated as the president of the American Association for Applied Linguistics (aaal) at its annual conference in March. Conference presenters included numerous Institute faculty members and more than 30 alumni who have gone on to earn their PhDs. “It was inspirational and heartwarming to hear tesol alumni describe attending miis as one of their most significant educational and professional experiences,” said Graduate School of Translation, Interpretation and Language Education Dean Renee Jourdenais, who also gave a plenary address.

including Director William Potter, Deputy Director Elena Sokova, Senior Fellow Miles Pomper, Eurasia Nonproliferation Program Director Bryan Lee, Senior Program Manager Margarita Sevcik, Scientist in Residence Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress, Senior Research Associate Chen Kane, as well as Moore. ›› Students Bo Kim manpts ’16,

Nick Lambson matlm ’16, Carly Laywell manpts ’16, and Jeremy Borgia mba/ maidp ’16 represented the Institute at the Cyber 9/12 competition organized by the Atlantic Council and hosted

by American University in Washington, D.C. in March.

Professor Philipp Bleek and Executive Director for Research Centers and Initiatives Amy Sands served as coaches for the team. While they didn’t advance to the finals, the students enjoyed the competition and took advantage of the networking and educational opportunities. ›› Professor

George Moore, scientist in residence at cns, chaired the opening day of interpol’s Global Counter Nuclear Smuggling Conference in Lyon, France, on January 27. The conference involved representatives from more than 120 countries and was held as part of interpol’s preparation for the final Nuclear Security Summit in March. The latter meeting in Washington, D.C., was attended by CNS experts ›› Dr.

Bleek also traveled to Atlanta for the annual convention of the International Studies Association, where he presented two papers coauthored with students. Zak Kallenborn manpts ’15 joined Bleek to present a paper initiated from a memo Zak wrote for Bleek’s Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Terrorism seminar.

Bleek presented a chapter coauthored with Nick Kramer manpts ’15 on a related topic.

AWARDS AND ACHIEVEMENTS ›› On February 6, the Monterey

County Business Council recognized the Institute for its significant contribution to the economic health of the region with its 2016 Economic Vitality Award in the category of Higher Education and Research. Accepting the award, Vice President of Academic Affairs and Dean of the Institute Jeff DaytonJohnson noted, “While many of our students, faculty, and staff live, eat, and shop in downtown Monterey, the ripples of their community involvement extend much farther out into the county.” ›› Three students—Maren

Farnum maiep ’15, Jessica Morten maiep ’15, and Melis Okter maiep ’16—were among 21 recipients of the California Sea Grant Fellowship in 2016.

The fellowships, awarded annually, offer graduate students and recent graduates the opportunity to obtain job experience at a host agency in California involved with marine policy, environmental quality, and resource management. ›› Five alumni are currently

representing the Institute in the U.S. State Department English Language Fellows program (elf). ELF places qualified U.S. educators with graduate degrees in Teaching Foreign Language (tfl), Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (tesol), or Applied Linguistics in projects around the world designed

On the Map

At MIIS, experts in the Center for Nonproliferation Studies opine on North Korea; Frontier Market Scouts earn national plaudits; and more.

MONTEREY BAY

FISHERMAN’S WHARF

TOP SCOUT S The Institute’s social impact investing fellowship program Frontier Market Scouts (fms) was again recognized by Ashoka U as a leader in the field of social entrepreneurship education. In 2013, fms won the Ashoka U-Cordes Innovation Award, given to university programs focused on promoting social entrepreneurship. The Cordes Innovation Award Hall of Fame recognizes Awardees that have significant impact on the way colleges and universities integrate social innovation into higher education.

E YE ON NORTH KORE A North Korea’s continuing efforts to advance its nuclear weapons program through rocket tests, propaganda videos, and saber-rattling threats generated heavy media coverage over the past several months, much of it quoting Institute experts Jeffrey Lewis and Melissa Hanham. Lewis and Hanham were quoted by media outlets including the Associated Press, cnn, The Economist, Foreign Policy, and npr.

MUNICIPAL WHARF

E NG LISH SPOK E N H E RE In January, teachers from intensive English programs across the nation gathered in Monterey for the 8th annual English U.S.A. professional development conference, hosted on the Institute campus. Seven alumni presented at the conference and many others attended. The conference also featured a mini-reunion of graduates of the Institute’s Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (tesol) and Teaching Foreign Language (tfl) degree programs.

Summer 2016 13

Communiqué

IN BRIEF

I believe this dialogue contributed to a better understanding of the nuclear and security challenges on the Korean Peninsula.

—cns Director William Potter on a special workshop convened for high-level diplomats from the U.S. and Russia at miis

to support English language learning. “Being selected for this program is one of the most prestigious positions you can achieve,” says Professor Kathi Bailey. The five fellows are Alicia Brill matesol ’13, Tylie Cramer maiem/ matesol ’15, Patrick Gaebler matesol ’12, Lisa Weiss matesol ’15, and Maggie Steingraeber matesol ’12.

Scholar, receiving grant support to spend spring 2017 at Dublin City University. Kropp’s project, titled “Understanding Motivations, Attitudes and Behaviors of Social Entrepreneurs in Ireland,” is the continuation of a research agenda for which he had work published in the Journal of Small Business and Management and Entrepreneurship and Regional Development.

›› A student team from the

Institute won second place and a $5,000 cash award in The Economist‘s 2016 Which mba? case competition. Another Institute team won the competition last year. The 2016 team consisted of Michael Mahoney mba ’16, Hesham Alsaati mba/maiep ’17, and Thomas Gilmore mba/maiep ’17.

›› Visiting Professor Rufus

Yerxa was named the new president of the National Foreign Trade Council in Washington, D.C. Yerxa previously served as a deputy U.S. trade representative i and served for years as deputy director general of the World Trade Organization. ›› Thomas Gray mantps

›› A student team comprised of

Patty Viafara mba ’18, Clover Van Steenberghe mba ’16, and Angelina Skowronski mba/ maiep ’16, received honorable mention in the Aspen Institute’s 2016 Business & Society International mba Case Competition, placing them in the top 10 of a group of 25 business schools from around the world.

’15 is beginning a two-year National Nuclear Security Administration fellowship to work as a junior professional officer with the International Atomic Energy Agency (iaea).

He is the first person to receive the highly competitive fellowship created to honor Dr. Ian Hutcheon, a former researcher at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

›› Professor Fredric Kropp

›› University of New Mexico

has been named a Fulbright

Assistant Professor of English

14

Communiqué

Cristyn Elder matesol ’00 was elected by the members of the Council of Writing Program Administrators to the organization’s executive board.

Elder will begin a three-year term on July 1.

attracts student competitors from many of the world’s major Chinese translation and interpretation programs. The students were accompanied by their coach, Professor JuiChing (Wallace) Chen mati ’95

›› “Fish Cubed” was the title

COLLABORATIONS

of a proposal developed by six current students and one alumna that won “Best Startup Idea” at the Salinas Ag Tech Summit in April. “Fish Cubed,” which involves using aquaponics and aeroponics to produce fresh produce and proteins using very little energy and water, evolved from a student project for a new course called “Green Business Feasibility Assessment.” It’s the brainchild of Alex Kalish maiep ’19, Kenji Tabery maiep ’16, Janna Ratzlaff maiep ’15, Sophia Eva Longas BAIS ’17, Hesham Al-Saati mba/maiep ’17, Jessica Anderson mba ’17, and Rebekah Anne Cordell mba/maiep ’17.

›› A new partnership between

the Middlebury Institute and the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (better known by its Russian acronym mgimo) offers students the opportunity to earn both a Master’s in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies from miis and a Master’s in International Affairs from mgimo. Students spend their first semester in Moscow, followed by two semesters in Monterey. All subject-matter classes in both locations are taught in English, though most students also study a second language. The final semester is devoted to a professional internship. ›› In March, 70 students from

›› At the 6th Cross-Strait

Interpreting Contest in Taiwan, Jingxin Lin mati ’16 received first prize and Vanessa Cao maci ’16 received third prize. This is the fourth consecutive time that Institute students placed in this highly competitive contest, which

the Middlebury Institute, California State University Monterey Bay, the Naval Postgraduate School, UC Berkeley, and Stanford convened at miis for the International Strategic Crisis Negotiation Exercise. The exercise was developed by

faculty and staff of the Army War College and organized

by Lt. Col. Chris Wendland, currently serving as an Army War College Fellow at the Institute. It was designed to simulate an internationally sanctioned peace conference called to break the longstanding conflict between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan over the contested Jammu-Kashmir region. ›› Professor Barry Olsen let

us know that in February, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies conducted a conference call in six languages (Arabic, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish) to discuss efforts to combat the Zika virus. The call used a ZipDX Multilingual platform that Olsen helped design to connect simultaneous interpreters remotely from all over Europe.

“The call had participants from 45 different countries on six continents, and the technology helped them address a pressing world health crisis in a timely manner in multiple languages,” said Olsen. ›› Mateo Rutherford mati

’03 and Karin Ruschke mat ’95 participated as subject matter experts (sme) on the Certification Commission for Healthcare Interpreting Job Task Analysis from January through April 2016. The panel includes a diverse group of medical-interpreting smes covering a broad range of interpreting modes, settings, and languages.

›› The Institute’s first Tyler

Distinguished Scholar in Residence was Randel Carlock, ensead’s Senior Affiliate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Family Enterprise, who visited Monterey from March 29 through April 11 and delivered three public lectures designed to help develop ideas about how miis can incorporate family business entrepreneurship into its curriculum. This new program is designed to bring outstanding academics from other institutions to the Institute for brief, focused visits. ›› The annual Critical Issues

Forum hosted by cns offers high school students from around the world the opportunity to participate in a conference on nuclear nonproliferation issues.

Students from seven American high schools, six Japanese high schools, and three Russian high schools gathered at the Santa Catalina School in Monterey in April to discuss nuclear security issues and hear from experts, including former U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry. “It’s a ground-breaking program just for high school students,” said Program Manager Masako Toki MAIPS ’00

PUBLICATIONS ›› Science and Sensibility:

Negotiating an Ecology of Place, by Professor Michael Vincent McGinnis of the International Economic Policy program, addresses the need for ecology to engage with

philosophical values and economic motivations in a process of negotiation. Case studies from watershed, coastal, and marine habitats help illustrate how placebased ecological negotiation can occur and how reframing our negotiation process can influence conservation and environmental policy in effective ways. n

PASSAGES ›› Robert West “Bob”

Lundeen, former chairman of the Institute Board of Trustees and longtime supporter of the Institute, passed away at his home in Orcas Island, Washington, on April 13. He was 94 years old. Lundeen and his late wife Betty touched the lives of many Institute faculty through the Robert and Betty Lundeen Junior Faculty Development Fund they established in 1998. At the time, he said, “It is an ongoing challenge for any college or university to provide resources for junior faculty who are in the early years of their careers, and who may need ‘bridging’ support to finance special research projects, attendance at scholarly meetings, time off from regular teaching assignments, and similar responsibilities. By establishing this fund, we hope to provide a portion of those needed resources.” Lundeen received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the Institute in 1992, and in 1999, the Institute named him as its Distinguished Honoree on National Philanthropy Day. n

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

Matt Jennings SENIOR EDITORS

Jason Warburg Eva Guðbergsdóttir DESIGNER

Paul Dahm VICE PRESIDENT FOR COMMUNICATIONS AND MARKETING

Bill Burger

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Summer 2016 15

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