Alan Speaking at "Forum: The Many Schools of Democracy"

Forum: The Many Schools of Democracy

Monday, April 9
7:30pm
Room RH305, Gottesman Libraries, Teachers College, 120th Street

Towards the end of the 20th century, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the demise of many Latin American dictatorships initiated a new wave of democratization in the world. Besides programs directly aimed at
developing the capacities for democratic governance of transitioning countries, many other activities undertaken by the international development community indirectly improve citizens' proficiencies for democratic participation.

At this forum we will hear our speakers' ideas and experiences concerning how these later approaches help fulfill the democratic promise.

Forum speakers:
Alan Cordova is a MBA candidate (Class of 2008) at the Columbia Business School with an interest in social enterprise and entrepreneurship (or, more specifically, getting the ball rolling in Central Asia!). He is originally from Seattle, WA, and graduated from Williams College in 2006 with a BA in Political Science and Astronomy.

Colleen McGinn is a doctoral student at the Columbia School of Social Work, specializing in disaster mental health. She is an experienced humanitarian aid worker who has managed emergency and development programs around the world, including in such trouble spots as Sierra Leone, Afghanistan, and the Balkans. Prior to that, she worked for a number of years in Washington, DC on advocacy and policy issues related to human rights, humanitarian programming, and conflict resolution, including serving as Acting Asia Advocacy Director for Amnesty International. She has a BA in Political Science from Ohio University and a MS in Development Studies from Tulane. Colleen will discuss the mainstreaming of conflict resolution and democratization into development programming, particularly the "Do No Harm" framework for participation in contexts of communal conflict

Nicolas Stahelin is a MA candidate in the International Educational Development program at Teachers College, and is the service-learning coordinator for the Peace Corps Fellows Program at this institution. In this position he collaborates with NYC high-poverty public school teachers to implement curriculum-based
service projects with their students. Previously he helped coordinate service-learning initiatives and taught high school bioethics at Tandem Friends School in Charlottesville, VA. With a BA in Environmental Studies from Oberlin College (2002), Nicolas also worked for three years in the Amazon region of northern Brazil
with the School for International Training, an accredited institution that provides undergraduates with semester-long experiential study abroad programs around the world.