Tag Archives: alumni

Two Students, Alumnus Embark on Language, Culture Studies Across Globe

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June 19th, 2019

By Ryan Dougherty

Two Swarthmore students and a 2019 grad received coveted awards from the Critical Language Scholarship (CLS) Program and have embarked on summer studies in Eastern Europe, East Africa, and Central Asia.

Carole Lee ’21, Zackary Lash ’19, and Anya Slepyan ’21

Carole Lee ’21, Zackary Lash ’19, and Anya Slepyan ’21

Zackary Lash ’19, who graduated with a special major in peace & conflict studies, is studying Russian in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia; Carole Lee ’21, an English literature major from Vidalia, La., is studying Swahili in Arusha, Tanzania; and Anya Slepyan ’21, a history major from Lexington, Ky., is studying Russian in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

Underwritten by the U.S. Department of State, the CLS Program offers “unparalleled opportunity to develop language skills and cultural fluency by a rigorous, eight-week immersive curriculum that includes language training, cultural activities, and site visits,” says Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science Osman Balkan, who serves as Swarthmore faculty representative for the program.

“The CLS is one of the most prestigious and competitive language programs in the country,” adds Balkan. “It receives thousands of applications each year, and it’s a testament to the quality of our students that an institution as small as Swarthmore College has produced three CLS award winners this year.”

The program is part of a wider government effort to raise the number of American students studying and mastering foreign languages deemed critical to national security and economic prosperity, per the program website, playing “an important role in preparing students for the 21st century’s globalized workforce and increasing national competitiveness.”

Balkan, who was a resident director of the CLS Turkish program in Istanbul and Izmir, expects the Swarthmoreans “will have a wonderful, enriching experience this summer.” Their studies began in early to mid-June and will run through mid-August.

Lash, Lee, and Slepyan follow 16 Swarthmore students who have participated in the program since 2007, including Amalia Feld ’12. And that success should only grow, thanks to a recent addition to academic programming at the College.

“With the establishment of our new Global Studies minor, which offers an interdisciplinary approach to the study of politics, language, and culture,” says Osman, “Swarthmore students are even better positioned to apply for the CLS.”

Fatima Boozarjomehri 2018–2019, Lang Social Impact Fellow

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Congratulations to our alum Fatima Boozarjomehri ’17 as well as A’Dorian Murray-Thomas ’16!

From Swarthmore News and Events

By Ryan Dougherty
October 25th, 2018
Fatima Boozarhomehri '17

A’Dorian Murray-Thomas ’16 (left) and Fatima Boozarjomehri ’17 will build upon their Lang Opportunity Scholarship projects and mentor current Lang Scholars and other Swarthmore student innovators.

As this year’s pair of Lang Social Impact Fellows, A’Dorian Murray-Thomas ’16 and Fatima Boozarjomehri ’17 will “scale up” their efforts for social change with support from the Lang Center for Civic & Social Responsibility.

Murray-Thomas and Boozarjomehri will build upon their Lang Opportunity Scholarship projects this year and mentor current Lang Scholars and other Swarthmore student innovators.

“It is through the vision and generosity of Eugene M. Lang ’38, H’81 that communities facing significant challenges have come to know Swarthmore College students and alumni like A’Dorian and Fatima as social change-makers,” says Jennifer Magee, senior associate director of the Lang Center, who designed the Lang Social Impact Fellows program with input from Ben Berger, executive director of the Lang Center, and Salem Shuchman ’84, former Lang Scholar and current Board of Managers chair.

“We are grateful for the opportunity to innovate and build upon the success of the Lang Opportunity Scholarship Program with this pilot program in its second year,” Magee adds. “And we are motivated and inspired to work with A’Dorian and Fatima as they sustain and scale their initiatives.”

The fellowship will allow Murray-Thomas to scale up her SHE Wins project, which started as a Lang Scholar project working with 12–15-year-old girls in Newark, N.J., who had lost a parent or sibling to homicide. Since then, SHE Wins has expanded to an Engaged Scholarship project that works at “the intersection of educational studies, restorative justice, and adolescent psychology” to “empower the next generation of young women leaders.”

“I am thrilled about the opportunity to collaborate with various parts of the greater Swarthmore College community to further enhance the SHE Wins model, and to use my experience to give back to current Lang Scholars, like so many other Lang alumni have given to me,” says Thomas-Murray, who graduated from Swarthmore with a special major in political science and educational studies and, in 2016, was named College Woman of the Year by Glamour and a White House Champion of Change.

Boozarjomehri will expand her efforts with the Afghan refugee population of southern Tehran, designing projects to improve education access and quality for Afghan youth and diversifying economic opportunities for Afghan women. This year, she will broaden the scope of The Fanoos Project, a vocational training program for single mothers.

“I am most looking forward to continue building strong partnerships with local [nongovernmental organizations] and expanding the reach of the program to more mothers in new locations and with better facilities,” says Boozarjohmehri, who majored in Islamic studies and peace & conflict studies at Swarthmore, with support from the Project Pericles Fund. “I’m also really excited about developing a sustainable business model to ensure the continuation of the program for many years.”

Meet Eben Weitzman ’84 Conflict Resolution Professor and Consider Graduate Study

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Eben Weitzman '84 and George Lakey

Prof. Eben Weitzman ’84 and Prof. George Lakey at the 2012 PJSA meetings

It was great to have the opportunity to meet Eben Weitzman ’84 at the Peace and Justice Studies Association meetings at Tufts University during the fall 2012 semester. Prof. Weitzman was sharing information at the meetings about programs in conflict resolution at the University of Massachusetts, where he teaches.

He has kindly written a blog post about his Swarthmore experience and his career in conflict resolution studies:

————————————————–

My experience at Swarthmore provided the foundation for the directions my life has taken, especially my work in peace and conflict resolution.  The combination of Swarthmore’s roots in the Quaker tradition of commitment to peace and justice on the one hand, and its dedication to intellectual rigor on the other, spoke to me, inspired me, and gave me the tools I would need.
When I went looking for a Ph.D. mentor, I came across the great social psychologist Morton Deutsch—one of the founders of the field of conflict resolution—at Columbia University.  Mort would often say that he was looking for people with soft hearts and hard heads. I think this is about as important an idea as any for those of us in the conflict resolution business, and Swarthmore had already done a lot to help shape me in this direction.  Why soft hearts and hard heads?
Soft Hearts: If you work with conflict, chances are you do it because you care about something enough to do challenging, sometimes painful work.  That’s good.  The world needs more people like you.
Hard Heads:  Here’s the tricky part.  It’s good to be a softie.  It’s good to let your caring and your compassion drive your work.  But: Once you settle on a problem, now you have to think carefully, clearly, deeply, and systematically about the problem you’re trying to solve.
  • You have to hold yourself to high standards.
  • You have to subject your work to rigorous test, whether it’s empirical research or practice in the field.
  • You have to be willing to accept answers you don’t like.
Because as much as the world needs more people who care, what the world needs even more is people who care, and who also have what it takes to do something about the things they care about.  Swarthmore’s grounding in Quaker values, and its commitment to providing what I believe is one of the finest intellectual preparations you can find, is a perfect incubator for the soft-hearted, hard-headed people the world of peace and conflict resolution needs.
As a political science major at Swat with strong interests in psychology and philosophy as well, I had the opportunity to study political science with an eye on questions of justice, to learn about political philosophy, ethics, political psychology, cultural anthropology, and more.  And as any Swat student knows, being surrounded by dedicated, committed, engaged, visionary fellow students was one of the most important parts of the whole experience.  That’s one of the reasons both of my sons are studying there now.
I graduated from Swarthmore in 1984.  Since then I’ve earned a Ph.D. in social psychology, and had the opportunity to work with labor unions and human rights NGOs, corporations and schools, hospitals, animal rescue networks, Federal disaster relief teams, and more.  Right now I’m engaged with a project in Nigeria working on peace building between Christians and Muslims; a project here in Boston that provides dialogue channels between the federal law enforcement agencies and the local Muslim and Sikh communities; a group that uses the sport of Ultimate Frisbee (Go Earthworms and Warmothers!) to bring together Arab Israeli, Jewish Israeli, and Palestinian kids;  a project to promote more effective teamwork in local hospitals; and a leadership development and strategic planning process with a local union.

Eben Weitzman '84

Above all, the focus in my professional life is educating the next generation of peacemakers.  I direct the Graduate Programs in Conflict Resolution at UMass Boston, and I chair the Department of Conflict Resolution, Human Security and Global Governance in which those programs are located.  Our program here is driven by the orientation I’ve described here: it’s all about cultivating soft hearts and hard heads.

The program is designed to provide students with the ability to understand, effectively manage, and intervene in conflict situations that arise among individuals and groups, locally and globally. Students explore the causes, dynamics, and consequences of conflict in a variety of settings; they learn techniques of conflict analysis and resolution, problem solving, and collaborative decision making; and develop skills in negotiation, mediation, dialogue and facilitation.

Within UMass Boston we are housed in the John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies, a dynamic environment that houses three academic departments as well as numerous centers and institutes. These provide opportunities for students to participate in research and field projects locally and globally. Conferences and lectureships allow students to network with outstanding scholars and practitioners from a variety of fields.

Students come to our programs from six continents and more than thirty countries, bringing a wide range of backgrounds and a rich diversity of experience. Some are midcareer, while others arrive directly from undergraduate degree programs.

We have 2 current Fulbrights studying with us from abroad, and 8 new Fulbright applicants for the Fall!

Alumni of our programs are doing exciting and important things in a variety of settings; examples include:

Direct mediation services
United Nations ; World Bank
Superior Court of the District of Columbia
Metro-West Community Mediation

Ombuds offices
Princeton and Cornell Universities
National Institutes of Health
American Red Cross

Business and Non-Profits
eBay and PayPal (online dispute resolution)
Human Resources, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care
Mass General Hospital
Advocacy for Refugee & Immigrant Services for Empowerment
Ministry of Energy, Nigeria

Our beautiful campus on Boston Harbor offers our diverse student population both an intimate learning environment and the rich experience of a great American city.

I would love to hear from Swarthmore students looking for graduate study in conflict resolution, or even just curious to learn more about the field. Another good contact is our Associate Director, Roni Lipton roni.lipton (at) umb.edu

Please note that our deadline is fast approaching: it’s March 15!! If you are interested but may not be able to get things together by the deadline, please reach out to me directly and we’ll work with you.

Please also consider joining us in April for a 2-day symposium on Bridging Global Religious Divides, and consider submitting a paper for next October’s 10th Biennial Student Conference: “Conflict Studies: The Next Generation of Ideas.

I look forward to hearing from you!

Contact Information:
Eben A. Weitzman, Ph.D.
eben.weitzman (at) umb.edu
617-287-7238

Professor Ted Herman (1913-2010) Swarthmore class of 1935

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[This blog post appeared on the Peace and Conflict Studies main blog on Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011.]

Ted Herman, an important figure in the development of Peace Studies, recently passed away.  Prof. Herman lived not far from Swarthmore and was well known in the area.  We would like to share this tribute from another major peace studies scholar, Dr. Ian Harris, and express our appreciation and condolences to Prof. Herman’s friends, family, and colleagues.

Ted Herman (1913-2010)

Prof. Lee Smithey, Nobel laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire, and Prof. Ted Herman at a Pendle Hill Peace Forum lecture at Swarthmore in March 2004

Ted Herman was a pioneer in the peace studies community. He was one of many Quaker scholar/midwives who helped nurture the field of peace studies in the 1960s.    He founded a peace studies program at Colgate University at the height of the Vietnam war. This program now has both a minor and a major in peace and conflict studies.

Ted Herman grew up in West Philadelphia and was a soccer star in his youth.  He did his undergraduate work at Swarthmore (graduating in 1935) and completed a Ph.D. in geography at the University of Washington.  In the interim he taught in China.  He joined the faculty at Colgate University as a professor of geography in 1955 and founded there in 1971 one of the earliest peace studies programs in the United States. He inspired many students to take seriously the study of nonviolence and to pursue careers devoted to peace. Largely because of Ted the Colgate program has a unique emphasis upon geography and trouble spots in the world–like the Middle East, Central America, Africa, or Central Asia–integrating trans-disciplinary academic approaches to war and peace with the study of particular regional conflicts.

Ted Herman was a fantastic mentor.  He mentored me and many other young professors in the nineteen eighties who were attracted to the field of peace studies in response to the growing nuclear threat. I remember well meeting with him at COPRED (Consortium on Peace Research, Education, and Development) and International Peace Research Association (IPRA) conferences. His calm determination and self confidence convinced many of us that we could leave the shelter of our traditional disciplines and walk down the path of peace. Ted Herman understood well how the study of peace could enhance the academy and made it his life’s mission to promote it.

Ted Herman devoted considerable time to bringing together enemies on multiple sides of the Balkan conflict.  In his retirement he often visited the Balkans trying to get Serbs to talk to people from Bosnia-Herzegovina.    He helped establish a peace studies program in Macedonia. I remember him coming to Milwaukee in 1995 and meeting with an important Serbian bishop in the orthodox church and leaders from the Bosnian community.

Professor Ted Herman '35

Professor Ted Herman ’35

Towards the end of his life Ted Herman became convinced that the best way to promote peace studies was through peace research. He threw his considerable talents behind the International Peace Research Association Foundation (IPRAF) a non-profit, tax-exempt organization founded in 1990 to further the purposes of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA) and enhance the processes of peace. With his support IPRAF has carried out peace research projects in the Balkans and the Middle East.  It offers women from developing countries scholarships to study peace at the graduate level and provides small peace research grants to further the field of peace research. (For more information see http://www.iprafoundation.org/) Ted Herman reveled in the rich exchanges that took place at IPRA conferences where scholars from around the world shared their insights into ways to generate peace.

Ted Hermann is held in the hearts of hundreds of peace educators and social activists, like myself, who have been inspired by his quiet determination to promote nonviolence. His memorial service will take place Jan 22, 2011 at 1 p.m. at Lancaster Friends Meeting in Lancaster, PA. I would like encourage those of you who live in the area to consider attending this service to honor an important pioneer in the field of peace and conflict studies.

Ian Harris
Professor emeritus
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Ted Herman (1913-2010)

Ted Herman was a pioneer in the peace studies community. He was one of many
Quaker scholar/midwives who helped nurture the field of peace studies in the
1960s.	He founded a peace studies program at Colgate University at the height
of the Vietnam war. This program now has both a minor and a major in peace and
conflict studies.

Ted Herman grew up in West Philadelphia and was a soccer star in his youth.  He
did his undergraduate work at Swarthmore (graduating in 1935) and completed a
Ph.D. in geography at the University of Washington.  In the interim he taught
in China.  He joined the faculty at Colgate University as a professor of
geography in 1955 and founded there in 1971 one of the earliest peace studies
programs in the United States. He inspired many students to take seriously the
study of nonviolence and to pursue careers devoted to peace. Largely because of
Ted the Colgate program has a unique emphasis upon geography and trouble spots
in the world--like the Middle East, Central America, Africa, or Central
Asia--integrating trans-disciplinary academic approaches to war and peace with
the study of particular regional conflicts.

Ted Herman was a fantastic mentor.  He mentored me and many other young
professors in the nineteen eighties who were attracted to the field of peace
studies in response to the growing nuclear threat. I remember well meeting with
him at COPRED (Consortium on Peace Research, Education, and Development) and
International Peace Research Association (IPRA) conferences. His calm
determination and self confidence convinced many of us that we could leave the
shelter of our traditional disciplines and walk down the path of peace. Ted
Herman understood well how the study of peace could enhance the academy and
made it his life?s mission to promote it.

Ted Herman devoted considerable time to bringing together enemies on multiple
sides of the Balkan conflict.  In his retirement he often visited the Balkans
trying to get Serbs to talk to people from Bosnia-Herzegovina.	He helped
establish a peace studies program in Macedonia. I remember him coming to
Milwaukee in 1995 and meeting with an important Serbian bishop in the orthodox
church and leaders from the Bosnian community.

Towards the end of his life Ted Herman became convinced that the best way to
promote peace studies was through peace research. He threw his considerable
talents behind the International Peace Research Association Foundation (IPRAF)
a non-profit, tax-exempt organization founded in 1990 to further the purposes
of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA) and enhance the
processes of peace. With his support IPRAF has carried out peace research
projects in the Balkans and the Middle East.  It offers women from developing
countries scholarships to study peace at the graduate level and provides small
peace research grants to further the field of peace research. (For more
information see http://www.iprafoundation.org/) Ted Herman reveled in the rich
exchanges that took place at IPRA conferences where scholars from around the
world shared their insights into ways to generate peace.

Ted Hermann is held in the hearts of hundreds of peace educators and social
activists, like myself, who have been inspired by his quiet determination to
promote nonviolence. His memorial service will take place Jan 22, 2011 at 1
p.m. at Lancaster Friends Meeting in Lancaster, PA. I would like encourage
those of you who live in the area to consider attending this service to honor
an important pioneer in the field of peace and conflict studies.

Ian Harris