Nuclear Weapons Today: Physics and Politics

Nuclear Weapons Today: Physics and Politics, April 22 10:30 AM Eastern

The panel will feature experts Alexandre Debs (Yale Department of Political Science) and Lisbeth Gronlund (MIT Laboratory for Nuclear Security and Policy). Attendees will learn about the physics of nuclear weapons and missile defense, key recent innovations, and current political questions—including the challenge of nuclear non-proliferation and dangers posed by the war in Ukraine.

Onsite attendance is limited to members of the Yale community.

After the program, Student Pugwash will host a special viewing of the event video, followed by virtual small group discussions about nuclear weapons policy and risks (date and time TBD). If you are interested in this virtual viewing and discussion, let us know.

Quantum Computing and Global Affairs: A Conversation with IBM’s Mark Ritter

Quantum Computing and Global Affairs: A Conversation with IBM’s Mark Ritter, April 12 4:00 PM Eastern

What are the global implications of recent breakthroughs in both the theory and practice of quantum science? What are the potential roadmaps and notional timelines for the development of these emerging technologies? Will these advances strengthen cooperation or heighten the prospects of competition and conflict among nations?

This special session on “Quantum Computing and Global Affairs” will feature Mark Ritter, chair of the Physical Sciences Council at IBM and a widely recognized national leader and advocate for quantum science. He is a member of the National Quantum Initiative Advisory Committee, which provides independent advice to the President and Secretary of Energy on trends and developments quantum information science and technology, and how to maintain American leadership in this critical field.

Onsite attendance is limited to the Yale community, but virtual attendance is open to the public. 

Alexander (Sasha) Abashkin

Alexander (Sasha) Abashkin is a Russian educator who for more than 30 years has worked in the interests of developing US-Russia relations.  

In 1993 he joined Stanford University and co-founded the Moscow campus of Bing Overseas Studies. He served as the Program's Deputy Director (1993-2004) and then as Program Director (2005-2014). Stanford program in Moscow was one of 11 other programs around the world where Bing Overseas Studies delivers education to Stanford-only students interested in studying abroad.  

At some point, Alexander was also invited to head the Center for International Projects of the Russian Academy of National Economy, where his mission was to develop cooperation with foreign universities and organizations. He has formed partnerships with Harvard’s Davis Center, State University of New York, Georgia Tech, University of Southern California, University of Pennsylvania, Brigham Young University, and several other universities. Thanks to his acquaintance with Sherman, Russian students became regular participants in the EPIIC Symposia.

He co-founded and served as Executive Director for the Academy’s “Preparing Global Leaders Summit” (PGLS), a premiere international educational program for best young professionals. The program sought to provide aspiring global scholar-leaders with the tools that are necessary for effective leadership in an increasingly complex world. In the last three years the program of its existence it was attended by young leaders from about 80 countries. 

Alexander founded and supervised RANEPA’s English-language Masters’ program, the first Master’s program in Russia for local and international students studying management which is taught fully in English. He promoted the program internationally to help attract students and faculty from more than 20 countries, including US, Canada, France, India, Macedonia, Bulgaria, FSU countries. 

Thanks to Alexander's efforts, hundreds of Americans had the opportunity to learn Russian, to get to know Russia, its culture, and people. Many of them have now become respected professionals and work in important positions, including in the US Presidential Administration. In today's Russia, such an achievement became a black mark, which prompted Alexander to leave Russia. Now he hopes to find a position that will allow him to aid scientists from Ukraine, as well as those ones from Russia and Belarus, who oppose the war with Ukraine and are therefore persecuted by the Russian authorities. 

In my experience with Sasha, he was a consummate professional, brilliantly alive, and sensitive to cultural and educational nuances, and courageous and ethical in his thinking. I had the pleasure of working with him in my Institute’s TILIP program, when wonderful Russian students attended multiple international programs of the Institute, particularly EPIIC.  

I was invited and hosted by Sasha to give graduate-level lectures at RANEPA on global challenges. I particularly remember one lecture when, based on Steven Coll’s book on global energy, Private Empire: Exxon Mobil and American Power, I challenged Russian students to think about the implications of their energy policies in Europe and particularly in the Arctic, both sadly now contested areas of hot and potential conflict.  

In what might have been one of the most embarrassing moments of my tenure as the Director of the Institute, where for years I was preparing and advising students on their international, immersive educational experiences, occurred when I and my wife traveled to Moscow on what we thought were valid visas. One day, I had received an incredibly formal-looking, embossed document by certified mail from the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA) including a wax chop seal securing the envelope. The letter was printed on parchment vellum and entirely in Russian, a language I could not read. It was followed up by an email from the Presidential Academy the very next day, asking whether I had received my visa. Idiotically, given the timing, I believed that what I had indeed received was my visa, expressly delivered. I did not translate the letter, which had both my and Iris’s formal names in elaborate script, and I immediately emailed back to who I thought was my official Russian contact that I had.  

It was an all-expense-paid trip, and they sent first-class tickets, but it was not a direct flight, with a required stop-over in Amsterdam. We enjoyed the city, and arrived early at Schiphol Airport, where we were the source of some consternation at the Aeroflot gate when I presented our documents. Officials agitatedly conferred, all in Russian, and after considerable delay, they apologized and ushered us onto the plane.  

Upon arriving at approximately two in the morning, we were immediately stopped at customs and ushered into a pale green, windowless room, interrogated separately, and informed that we had entered illegally and that we would be unceremoniously deported back to Europe on the next flight, which was perhaps four hours later. What I had assumed was my visa was simply an invitation to travel to Washington to the Russian Embassy to get the formal visa.  

I felt remarkably embarrassed, humiliated, and stupid, and I could only imagine the humiliation of disappointing Sasha, who had made elaborate plans to host us, as well as the humiliation I would face returning to Tufts, where I departed as an official envoy between two universities. Luckily, a Russian employee of KLM took pity on the two of us and got a message out to Sasha in the middle of the night. Sasha worked his magic. He had contacts at the highest levels of the Russian government and after several hours of pure dismay, we were suddenly ushered into Sheremetyevo International Airport, where Edward Snowden would spend a lot of time in limbo. Upon my return to Tufts, I made sure to tell this embarrassing story, which turned out well, to all of my students, who were travelling all over the world. They got a great laugh out of it, but seriously understood the necessity to more rigorously prepare than I had.  

My last time at the airport was decades earlier in the 1970s, when I remember bribing Russian custom officials with Penthouse pornographic magazines to not search our luggage, filled with human rights literature and personal letters to Jewish Russian refuseniks seeking to leave Russia for Israel, and Russian democrats seeking a democratic future in Russia. I was a courier for Amnesty International and the Union of International Concerned Jewry. Quite a different experience. I had made several trips, including one with then-not-notorious Alan Dershowitz, when we each had parts of a small camera we assembled to bring documents back from Russian Laureate Andrei Sakharov.  

One note here: The graduate student escort that drove Iris and I around Moscow on a sightseeing tour turned out to be remarkably interesting, especially when he insisted that Jews were responsible for the 9/11 bombing of the World Trade Center. His “evidence” was that all Jews were alerted by the Israeli Mossad to evacuate the buildings before the planes struck. As I reflect on this, I think about the persistent anti-Semitism in Russia, the news blackout over the war in Ukraine, and the perverse irony of Putin arguing his “military exercise” was to de-Nazify Ukraine, and how Russian propaganda asserts that Zolensky — a Jew — has a Nazi-like brain.

The Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights: 14th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy

Support Convisero Mentor Irwin Cotler, the Founder and Chair of The Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, at the 14th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy.

The Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights (RWCHR) is proud to co-sponsor, along with leading human rights NGOs from around the world, the 14th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy, taking place on April 6th, 2022.

Tune in live for a discussion on the plight of political prisoners moderated by RWCHR Legal Counsel Yonah Diamond, with Areej Al-Sadhan, activist and sister of Saudi political prisoner Abdulrahman al-Sadhan, Sophie Luo, activist and wife of Chinese political prisoner Ding Jiaxi, Tatsiana Khomich, activist fighting to free Belarus political prisoners including her sister Maria Kalesnikava, and Mariam Claren, daughter of jailed political prisoner in Iran Nahid Taghavi.

See here for the full program.

RefugePoint: Centering Refugee Voices in Humanitarian Response and Philanthropy

Join Convisero Mentor and President of RefugePoint Sasha Chanoff and other distinguished refugee and philanthropic voices in two panels on Friday, April 8, 2022, at 11 am EDT.

By 2050, a billion people may be forcibly displaced. $30 billion a year is spent on humanitarian aid today. Yet recipients have virtually no say in its use, a fact that perpetuates paternalism and inequality. As part of the Skoll World Forum Eco-System Day, RefugePoint is hosting a two-part moderated discussion that brings together refugee and philanthropic voices to discuss strategies for centering refugees in programmatic and philanthropic responses.

This event will have two 45-minute panels. Composed of former refugees, Panel #1 will flip the narrative of victimhood and define refugees more fully. Moderated by Farah Mohamed, former CEO, Malala Fund, and current RefugePoint board member. Building on the first discussion, Panel #2 brings together philanthropic and nonprofit leaders to discuss eco system funding and other programmatic and funding strategies that center refugee and community voices. Moderated by Sasha Chanoff, Founder and CEO, RefugePoint. Moderators will also invite audience participation to highlight best practices.

Speakers include:

Nasra Ismail, Senior Director, Global Strategy, Giving Tuesday Bahati Ernestine, Consultant/Advocate, RefugePoint/Economic Mobility Pathways ProjectLina Tori Jan, Public Speaker/Advocate/Founder, Chai wa Dastan/UNICEFKaren Ansara, Founder, Network of Engaged International Donors (NEID) Sana Mustafa, Director of Partnership and Engagement, Asylum Access: Resourcing Refugee Leadership Initiative

RefugePoint: Global Task Force on Refugee Labour Mobility

Join Convisero Mentor and RefugePoint’s Founder and CEO Sasha Chanoff in a panel discussion on The Transformative Potential of Refugee Labour Mobility Pathways on Wednesday, April 6, at 3:00 pm EDT.

Across the globe, millions of people are displaced and in need of a safe, permanent place to call home. Labour complementary pathways allow people to enter or stay in another country through safe and regulated avenues for purposes of employment, with the right to either permanent or temporary residence. Sasha Chanoff, RefugePoint’s Founder and CEO, will participate in a panel discussion on The Transformative Potential of Refugee Labour Mobility Pathways during the virtual launch of the Global Task Force on Refugee Labour Mobility. RefugePoint and other founding Task Force members will provide an introduction to the goals of the Global Task Force, discuss the value of expanding labour pathways accessible to refugees, and invite interested stakeholders to become involved.

Event highlights will include addresses from The Honourable Sean Fraser, Canada’s Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship; Mr. Filippo Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; and Ms. Bahati Ernestine, Economic Mobility Consultant (RefugePoint) and a Continuing Care Assistant (Glen Haven Manor) who immigrated to Canada as a health worker via Canada’s Economic Mobility Pathways Pilot (EMPP).

Please confirm your attendance by registering via Zoom by Monday, April 4. 

Benjamin Perlstein

Rabbi Ben Perlstein is a Chaplain Resident at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, serving primarily on the Columbia University Irving Medical Center campus. He worked previously as a Rabbinic Fellow at Romemu in Manhattan and received rabbinic ordination in 2021 from the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he also completed an M.A. in Jewish Thought focused on ethics and mysticism.

Ben previously graduated summa cum laude from Tufts University, where he studied political science and participated in the Institute for Global Leadership's EPIIC and Synaptic Scholars programs. He is also a grateful alumnus and current junior faculty member of FASPE (Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics), and through the international Jewish education organization Kivunim, Ben has spoken at the U.N. on the complexities of contemporary Holocaust commemoration and participated in the first Holocaust conference in the Arab world. He is passionate about creative, multidisciplinary and multifaith applications of spiritual wisdom and practice to issues of public concern and pastoral need.

Abuzar Royesh

Abuzar Royesh is the co-founder and CEO of DataServeAI (Sabi Cash), a California-based startup that builds digital financial solutions for small businesses in Africa. Abuzar holds master’s degrees in Management Science & Engineering and International Policy from Stanford University as a Knight-Hennessy scholar and a bachelor’s degree from Tufts University in International Relations.

Prior to Stanford, Abuzar worked as a research lead at Afghanistan Holding Group, where he led various research and assessment projects for the office of the Afghan president, various ministries, USAID, UNHCR, and GIZ. He has also worked with marginalized youth, including international displaced persons, in Afghanistan in various capacities since 2010.

He was recently selected for Forbes 30 under 30 along with 5 other Tufts alumni.

30 Birds Foundation: Live Update from Pakistan

On Thursday, March 17th at 9AM PST / 12PM EST / 4PM UK Time / 5PM Monaco Time, The 30 Birds Foundation will be having a special live Zoom call from Pakistan. This will be a rare opportunity to see some of the Hazara schoolgirls face to face and to talk with them about their experiences.

In August, 2021, as the Taliban violently took Afghanistan, thousands of Hazara schoolgirls were forced into hiding. Some of the most at-risk were from Marefat - the first school in Afghanistan to bring girls and boys into the same classroom.

Marefat supporters from around the world, ordinary citizens, came together to help the most at-risk girls. Now known as the 30 Birds Foundation, they partnered with the girls to plan their escape. While 30 Birds built relations with ambassadors, generals and even Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai, the bravest girls played an active part in coordinating their own evacuation. Under duress, moving themselves in small groups from city to city and past Taliban checkpoints, these girls helped 30 Birds guide over 400 at-risk Afghans safely across the border.

Half made it to Canada. The other half, including 50 young women who fled without families, are stuck in Pakistan. The 30 Birds Foundation, co-founded by my previous student Abuzar Royesh and The Trebuchet’s Co-Director Jennifer Selendy, is raising funds to reunite this community in Canada.

Please RSVP for the event here.

Ukraine and the Future of Arms Control: A conversation with Michael Krepon

March 26, 2022, 1:00pm EST

Russia’s brutal war against Ukraine comes at a time when every state possessing nuclear weapons is modernizing or plans to modernize its nuclear forces. One by one, arms control treaties have been discarded. Essential norms, including the norm against waging aggressive war as well as humanitarian laws of warfare have been disregarded. We live in a deeply disheartening time. But opportunities exist in in every crisis. Let’s discuss this war, how something truly awful might to turned into something good, and steps we might take to change course.

Michael Krepon is the author of Winning and Losing the Nuclear Peace: The Rise, Demise, and Revival of Arms Control, a much-needed contemporary analysis of the role arms control played in "winning" the nuclear peace. It could hardly come at a more important time. Join Mr. Krepon and Student Pugwash USA for an interactive and engaging discussion, and hear what hope might still remain to rebuild the nuclear peace.

Additional information: <https://www.studentpugwash.org/krepon-talk>

Registration for the event: <https://na.eventscloud.com/krepon-mar26>

Liz Shelbred

Liz recently graduated from Tufts University with a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and Civic Studies. She has spent her time at Tufts focusing her studies on the intersection between global accountability and grassroots civic action as a potential solution to social injustice.

Since her first year at Tufts, The Tufts Daily provided her not only with a strong community but also a means of preserving the truth and mobilizing change on campus. She served as Associate Editor, Executive Opinion Editor, and a member of the Editorial Board. In her last year at Tufts, she wrote for the Investigative and News sections of the Daily, and was on the Journalism Education and Diversity Report Committees. She was also a member of Amnesty International at Tufts, where she learned about practical ways to prevent human rights abuses and deliver justice. Additionally, as part of the Tufts Experimental College’s Explorations program, she taught a first-year course on the covert history of CIA involvement in Latin America.

She followed her interest in transformative education to Education for Employment (EFE), where she aided in assembling a global network of prominent influencers, entrepreneurs, and venture capitalists to fund and promote EFE’s Fall 2020 Women’s Empowerment campaign across the MENA region. In the spring of 2020, she volunteered with the World Peace Foundation to track the spread of COVID-19 in prisons, jails, and ICE detention centers. With the Oslo Scholars program at the Tufts Institute for Global Leadership, she interned for Jamila Raqib and the Albert Einstein Institution this summer. There, she tracked nonviolent action in the news, researched the role of digital technologies and social media in nonviolent resistance, and aided in developing the AEI 2.0 platform. In October 2021, she attended the Oslo Freedom Forum in Miami.

After college, she hopes to pursue a career in human rights law and conflict resolution. She joined The Trebuchet to follow my belief in education and community to be the keys to dismantling systems of oppression and division.

Brandon Silver

Brandon Silver is an international human rights lawyer, and Director of Policy and Projects at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights.

In this capacity, Brandon serves on the legal teams of prisoners of conscience, representing some of the world's leading dissidents and statespeople. He also provides strategic counsel to governments, parliaments, and international organizations on rule of law and public policy reforms.

He formerly served in the office of then Liberal Party of Canada Leader and now Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and currently acts as Chief Advisor to former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and longtime Parliamentarian Irwin Cotler.

Brandon’s work has been featured in major publications, including TIME magazine, Canada's national news-magazine Maclean's, the Globe and Mail, Foreign Policy, and the Washington Post, and is a past nominee of the Quebec Literary Awards and winner of the CBC Reader’s Choice Prize. In 2016, the World Economic Forum named him a “Global Shaper.”

He is a graduate of the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, and received his Masters of Law from UC Berkeley on a scholarship for excellence in Public Law.

Brandon has had a transformative impact not only on the law, but on lives; not only in the courthouse, but in the court of global opinion; in each and all of his endeavours, he has represented the very best of what the Canadian legal profession stands for, securing liberty and dignity for the most vulnerable.

As international counsel to dissidents, he led the global advocacy that achieved freedom for political prisoners, including the release of our pro bono client Raif Badawi, the celebrated Saudi blogger whose wife and children are Canadian citizens.

As head of our Global Human Rights Sanctions Program, Brandon has become a trusted interlocutor and confidante to civil society and decisionmakers in Canada and internationally, making major contributions to the adoption, implementation, and refinement of sanctions frameworks for global justice and accountability. In the last 18 months, this has included among others, providing counsel to government and Parliament on recalibrating Canada’s sanctions frameworks - including Asset repurposing, legislation that is currently under consideration in the Senate - and successfully submitting sanctions proposals; advising and guiding the Australian Parliamentary Inquiry that led to the successful adoption of targeted sanctions legislation in that jurisdiction; and Canadian Chair of the Global Magnitsky Civil Society Coalition, representing over 275 organizations around the world engaged in human rights sanctions multilateralization and implementation.

At a time of resurgent intolerance, where Antisemitism remains the most frequent motivation of hate crime in Canada, and Holocaust distortion and denial runs rampant internationally, the creation of the role of Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism is as timely as it is necessary. After leading advocacy for the creation of the Office, and subsequently negotiating and drafting its mandate with Government, Brandon was also instrumental in the recent announcement that it will be a permanent Office with a dedicated staff.

When the International Bar Association and International Association of Women Judges reached out to highlight the plight and pain of Afghan legal leaders under threat, Brandon spearheaded our Centre’s response, working with committed and compassionate lawyers across Canada to successfully secure their safe resettlement. With hundreds of Afghans already being resettled thanks to his leadership, our efforts continue with partners in Canada and internationally to secure life-saving support for the many more who remain at risk.

Brandon has also served as trusted advisor to the High-Level Panel of Legal Experts on Media Freedom, established jointly by the governments of Canada and the UK to provide independent and substantive advice to governments on matters of law reform and public policy initiatives to protect and promote press freedom. In this capacity, Brandon has worked closely with Panel Vice-Chair Barrister Amal Clooney and her successor Barrister Can Yeginsu to publish important reports - and pursue advocacy - on myriad pressing matters ranging from consular protection to sanctions, and from hate speech to immigration and refugee measures, the latter of which led to Canada’s recent announcement of a dedicated visa stream for human rights defenders and journalists at risk.

I have known Brandon for years, having first met him in Oslo at the Human Rights Foundation's forums, I have been wonderfully impressed by his decency and initiative, and I am very honored to be his friend and "accomplice" in supporting dissidents and people at risk. I know from our common close friend, Irwin Cotler, just how valuable he is to the Wallenberg Foundation.

Ron Haviv’s Photographic work in Ukraine

Photography by mentor Ron Haviv.

There will be periodic updates of Ron’s work.

https://www.economist.com/1843/2022/03/02/a-brief-history-of-ukrainian-heroes

Allister Chang

Allister Chang was a Synaptic Scholar in the Tufts class of 2012. He is an elected member of the DC State Board of Education, a board member of Bibliothèques Sans Frontières, and an advisory board member of the Library of Congress Literacy Awards. Allister is currently developing social determinant of health interventions that meet underserved families where they are. 

Allister was a competitive figure skater growing up, which taught him how to fall. He studied social history at Tufts and at Oxford. For his senior thesis, he conducted an oral history of the first LGBTQ organization in East Asia, and moved to Taiwan to support this organization post-graduation. Allister studied social policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where he was elected President of Student Government. As Executive Director of Libraries Without Borders, Allister supported library systems around the world and developed education technologies that won the Google Impact Challenge and the Library of Congress Literacy Award. He is a Humanity in Action Senior Fellow, and an alumnus of the Robert Bosch Stiftung Fellowship, the Voqal Fellowship, and the Halcyon Fellowship. Allister has been a Visiting Researcher at the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin and UNESCO’s Institute for Lifelong Learning in Hamburg. At home in DC, Allister manages his local farmers’ market in Georgetown.

Lauren Lovelace

Lauren H. Lovelace participated in the Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) program at Tufts University under the guidance of Director (and Mentor Extraordinaire) Sherman Teichman (1990-92).  This EPIIC experience redirected her academic trajectory and inspired her professional life in public service.  

Lauren is a career Foreign Service Officer and currently serves as a Senior Advisor to the State Department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, focusing the Indo-Pacific region.   Her previous diplomatic assignments include Public Affairs Officer (PAO) in Chennai, India; Director of the Transatlantic Diplomatic Fellowship program; PAO Dublin, Ireland; Executive Director of the U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council at Georgetown University; PAO and Acting Deputy Chief of Mission, Dhaka, Bangladesh;  Assistant Information Officer, Cairo, Egypt; Political Officer and Staff Assistant, New Delhi, India; Vice Consul, Mumbai, India; Special Assistant on UN Reform at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in New York; and speechwriter to the Secretary of State and Bureau of European Affairs leadership on transatlantic security.  Lauren previously worked as an advisor to the Chancellor of the New York City Board of Education on school design and worked to develop schools for underserved communities in Harlem and Newark at the not-for-profit The Learning Project.   

Lauren is a graduate of Tufts University (BA94), the Fletcher School of International Law and Diplomacy (MALD95), and the University of Kentucky (MPA98).   She is the recipient of the State Department's Distinguished, Superior, and Meritorious Honor Awards.  She was a Transatlantic Diplomatic Fellow to the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and a National Security Education Program/Boren Fellow in St. Petersburg, Russia.  She is the Founder of the Edward M. Kennedy Center for Public Service and the Arts in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Lauren speaks French, Arabic, and Russian. She is a native of Kentucky.

Lauren provided one of the most compelling moments I can remember of my thirty plus years at the helm of the Institute. In our "Confronting Political and Social Evil " symposium of 1991, Lauren was a first-year student. She magnificently played the harp to accompany former prisoner of conscience Alicia Partnoy's reading her poignant and powerful poetry, which was introduced by Majorie Agosín. It took but several hours of a drive back and forth to Wellesley to meet with Marjorie for me to understand and witness the transformation of what such immersive exposure could mean for Lauren as a student and myself as an educator.

Decades before we explored the future of Russia in EPIIC, she travelled there in 1992 to conduct her prescient research theme — “Economic Growth vs. Environmental Security: The Future of Russia." Then, years later, as a seasoned professional, she accompanied another exemplary alum, Matan Chorev, in a dialogue on US foreign policy with a wonderful friend and ally of the Institute, the Hon. Les Gelb, in the wonderful garden of another friend and generous benefactor of the Institute, Edward Merrin.

Rayhan Asat: A Human-Rights-Oriented Foreign Policy Response to the Uyghur Genocide

Convisero Mentor Rayhan Asat presents with Harvard’s Human Rights Working Group on human-rights-oriented policy responses to the Uyghur Genocide.

Troy Lewis

Troy Lewis is an accomplished educator, youth development specialist, professional advisory muse, and social justice advocate. As the Chief Executive Officer of Education Services of Greater Washington, LLC (ESGW), he provides program-based services in the areas of workforce development, organizational capacity building, college access and personal responsibility. Troy’s professional background includes advanced program development and management skills, talent acquisition, mentor programming, leadership development, large group facilitation, college completion, professional development, and life skills. 

Troy provides expert services to local and federal government agencies, community-based organizations, educational institutions, and corporations to empower learners to reach their optimum potential through purposeful programming, intentional exposure, and access to reliable resources. He achieves results through innovative and high impact interactive turnkey Smart workshops, network training sessions, conferences, retreats, and other comprehensive program development platforms. Notably, Troy has consulted with the DC Department of Employment Services to develop a program to address the negative impact of gentrification. His work has aided DC young adults, who are out of the education pipeline, with college enrollment and international educational experiences abroad.  

Troy tributes his professional skill to his experiences with leading youth development programs and higher education institutions. After teaching high school mathematics at an alternative charter school, Troy was a Senior Trainer at the Posse Foundation. He helped identify, recruit, and train diverse student leaders to attend top-tier colleges. Troy directly supported college students and served as a Post-secondary Advisor at KIPP DC KIPP Through College office and academic advisor at the University of Maryland at College Park. At American University, he provided high profile federal internships to American Indians, Alaskan Natives, and Native Hawaiians at the USDA, Social Security Administration, National Institute of Health and the National Science Foundation. Troy also served as the Manager of Talent Acquisition and Campus Relations - Internships for the Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF), supporting college students and graduates of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) with securing federal internships across the country.

Troy provides resources and tools to those who aspire to achieve their educational, career, and life goals with a passion for inspiring and educating youth, young adults, and professionals. His activism on local and state boards and community volunteerism reflects his dedication to impact lives in various ways.

Troy holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Florida A&M University, studied Higher Education at University of Maryland College Park, and is pursuing a Master’s in Education in Education Leadership, Organizations, and Entrepreneurship at Harvard University. 

Dwijo Goswami

Dwijo Goswami is an Engagement Manager in digital and analytics at McKinsey & Company, living in New Delhi, India. At McKinsey, he leads digital strategy and transformation projects for leading consumer-facing enterprises across various industries and geographies. Prior to working with McKinsey, he was a financial management consultant in the skills division of India’s Ministry of Rural Development. 

There Mr. Goswami designed and implemented India’s first end-to-end real-time public expenditure tracking platform, in addition to coordinating policy and technology requirements and executing national roll-out of financial systems. 

Mr. Goswami also worked for The World Bank as a Consultant in Financial Management, where he piloted multiple technology innovations to reduce fund leakage. He implemented expenditure tracking systems in over 2,000 government primary schools in Odisha as well as scaled an e-payment system Odisha village health workers.

Mr. Goswami previously was a research associate at Abdul Latin Jameel Poverty Action Lab, where he worked with Nobel laureates Professors Esther Duflo and Abhijeet Banerjee on their largest public health project, which addressed anemia and low rural household incomes in Bhojpur district. 

As a John F. Kennedy Fellow, Mr. Goswami earned a Master degree in Public Administration and International Development at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in 2017. In 2011, he earned his Bachelor of Arts in Economics and International Relations at Tufts University. 

Dwijo was a stellar student in EPIIC, and participated in many of the Institute’s other initiatives and programs, including this photographic workshop of our EXPOSURE program in the summer of 2009 in Ajmer, India. He was also involved in the Empower program, in which he embarked on the study of microfinance.

Jeanette Bailey

Jeanette Bailey is the Nutrition Research and Innovation Lead at the International Rescue Committee (IRC), and an associate professor at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. She was the Principal Investigator on the Combined Protocol for Acute Malnutrition Study (ComPAS), a global clinical trial that tested a simplified and combined approach to treating severe and moderate acute malnutrition in children under age 5. The ComPAS protocol is now being researched in clinical and operational trials by non-governmental organizations, the United Nations, and governments in more than 12 countries. Jeanette is currently leading a research team at the IRC to design and test new interventions to improve the care and delivery of treatment to malnourished children globally.

Prior to joining the IRC, Jeanette spent nearly a decade overseas working in humanitarian programs with Doctors Without Borders, Save the Children and Action Against Hunger in multiple countries in Africa, Asia and South America. She received her PhD and MSc in Nutrition from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), and her BA in International Relations from Tufts University.

Roderick Cowan

Roderick Cowan may be the most famous person you have never heard of. His work has appeared in media around the world — from the New York Times and Washington Post to the Sydney Morning Herald and the Australian — and on the desks of presidents, prime ministers (one of whom wanted Cowan's head on a platter), politicians, academics, intellectuals, and corporate leaders. Yet, his name rarely appears in print, online, or on electronic media.

Cowan honed his persuasion skills disarming dangerous criminals or getting them to confess to crimes as a police officer and investigator in two of Britain's toughest districts — the east end of Glasgow and the east end of London. While on a leave of absence from London's Metropolitan Police, he discovered he had a talent for journalism, writing, and public speaking. He later added teaching to his skillset and did so from a practitioner's perspective.

Cowan prefers to remain behind the scenes, speechwriting, advising, and training. He now has over 30 years of experience writing, teaching, speaking at conferences and public events, and assisting in various government and corporate research and communications programs.

Cowan is currently the Executive Director, University of Chicago Center for Security and Threats (CPOST).

He has previously held several senior advisory roles, such as Research Fellow with the Research Network for a Secure Australia; Strategic Advisor to the Dubai-based Emirates Group Security/Edith Cowan University Centre of Aviation and Security Studies (CASS); Advisor to Macquarie University’s Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counterterrorism (PICT), where he developed and delivered its first Media Studies and Terrorism unit for its master’s course (MPICT).

His research focuses on digital communication issues in the security, intelligence, and law enforcement context, notably illicit trade, cyber security and human factors, social media, open-source risk, and communications skills. He has conducted workshops for and consulted with law enforcement, intelligence agencies, government entities, and corporations in Australia, Middle East, UK, and the EU on how digital technology, although providing many benefits, also represents severe threats to governments, businesses, communities, and individuals.

He regularly teaches communications subjects, such as crisis media management, interviewing, and practical writing skills. His clients include international corporations, such as IAG and Emirates Airlines, and Governments, such as the Georgian Parliament, Tbilisi, and the Australian Federal Attorney-General.

A speechwriter and advisor to public and private individuals, he is a member of the American Professional Speechwriters Association and the UK Speechwriters Guild.

Cowan has written for print media, appeared on national television and radio, and has received two industry awards for excellence for reporting in the security industry.

Before his communications career, Cowan was a police officer in the UK, initially serving in Scotland and then London's Metropolitan Police.