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Welcome to ITPIR's first newsletter of 2017. While most students and faculty have been back on campus for a little over a month, ITPIR projects have already hosted five major events in the Burg. Those events and updates from all the ITPIR projects are described in more detail below.

Before sharing these updates, I'd like to highlight a new initiative here on
campus that builds upon a close 
partnership between ITPIR, the Reves Center for International Studies and 
We are  excited to announce the  Whole of Government Center of Excellence
an  interagency policy research effort debuting through W&M's M as ter of Public  Policy (MPP) degree this fall. 
The Center's mission is to provide practical training on interagency collaboration, complex national security and other policy problems, and to support research into "Whole of Government" solutions to these challenges. This initiative complements the International Development Policy track in the MPP program that already draws upon and helps support various AidData research projects. 

The Whole of Government Center of Excellence offers the opportunity for mid-career military officers and policy professionals in federal, state and local agencies to gain practical training in solving complex national security problems and promoting interagency collaboration. ITPIR research projects will provide opportunities to MPP students to apply skills they learn in the classroom. Based on the positive experience of the PIPS Military Fellows Program (highlighted below), I expect that mid-career staff and military officers will also enhance the research and learning opportunities of traditional W&M students. 

If you read about the research breakthroughs and student programs described below, I think you will agree that ITPIR has a great deal to offer in support of this new initiative.

Mike Tierney '87
Director, ITPIR

EVENTS & VISITORS events
MAJOR GREGORY TOMLIN '01

Maj. Tomlin returned to his alma mater to discuss the past, present, and future of U.S. public diplomacy. He spoke on his recent book
Murrow's Cold War: Public Diplomacy for the Kennedy Administration and drew on experience from his own time serving overseas. 

Maj. Tomlin '01 sharing insights from his life and research.

   DR. PHILIP ROESSLER

Dr. Roessler, Assistant Professor of government at W&M and director of the Center for African Development, celebrated the release of two books with a lecture and reception. In the talk he touched on his research process and the dedication and luck behind it.
  
   
Steve Hanson, W&M Vice Provost for International Affairs, 
moderates a Q&A with Prof. Roessler.

  DR. CAROLY SHUMWAY

Dr. Shumway visited AidData and delivered a lecture titled "How Can We Transform International Development with Science?" She explored the ways USAID uses science and technology to optimize international development efforts.

An animated Dr. Shumway insists science should inform development policy.

PIPS MILITARY FELLOWS

Since 2013, every year PIPS research fellows receive invaluable, practical mentorship from officers across the branches of the U.S. Military. Several of the Military Fellows visited campus to participate in the weekly PIPS meeting, asking questions and giving feedback on student projects. 

PIPS in action alongside the Military Fellows.

U.S. PREMIER OF SARAJEVO ROSES

Because of the Bosnia Project, Norfolk-based photojournalist and filmmaker Roger M. Richards chose William & Mary to screen the U.S. premier of his documenta ry  Sarajevo Roses: A Cinematic Essay.  Richards spent time afterwards with recent and current Bosnia Project students, answering and asking questions. If you'd like to read more, both W&M News and the Virginia Gazette published articles on the screening.

Roger M. Richards, center, with past and present Bosnia Project students.

AIDDATA
aiddata
BEYOND AFRICA: THE IMPACT OF CHINESE INFRASTRUCTURE IN ECOLOGICAL HOTSPOTS 

AidData teamed up with the MacArthur Foundation to evaluate the impact of Chinese-funded infrastructure projects on conservation outcomes in three ecological hotspots. They generated and sub-nationally geocoded a dataset of 1,158 Chinese-funded projects in over 2,224 locations across 19 countries. Then, the team performed a geospatial impact evaluation to identify how threatened forests in two countries (Cambodia and Tanzania) changed when exposed to infrastructure projects. Read all about the findings in the First Tranche.

SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN 'S 
#5 WORLD CHANGING IDEA IN 2016
  
Ground-breaking research by scientists at Stanford University -- published last fall in Science and funded in part by AidData through its partnership with USAID's Global Development Lab -- has combined satellite imagery taken from space and machine learning to bring better measurements of poverty and economic development within reach. The ability to see how people and communities are doing, from space and for cheaper, could revolutionize the way aid and other development investments are targeted, coordinated, and evaluated. Scientific American  ranked the project, led by Stanford researchers Marshall Burke, Neal Jean, and David Lobell, fifth on their list of 2016's Top 10 World Changing Ideas.


EVEN MORE ANALYSIS ON AIDDATA'S BLOG  THE FIRST TRANCHE
  
Need more AidData? The First Tranche is here  with all the freshest news and resear ch. Check out the links below for some recent updates:

AidData launched the new Listening to Leaders survey to collect 360-degree feedback on development priorities, progress, and performance from policymakers and practitioners in 126 low- and middle-income countries. 

What are development corridor strategies, and do they work? Executive Director Brad Parks explores the trend of governments targeting public and private investments in specific geographic areas in the hopes of creating spatial "development corridors." 
 
If the Trump administration wants to reform U.S. foreign assistance programs, AidData has a suggestion: focus on rigorous impact evaluations. Projects that do tend to perform better than those that do not.

THE BOSNIA PROJECTbosnia
    MEET THE SUMMER '17 TEAM
  

Clockwise from top left: Aaron Spitler, Evan King, 
Jasmine Curry,  Salma Elsayed-Ali, Carolyn Meyers.

This summer's group are the 18th to participate in the Bosnia Project, William & Mary's longest-running international service trip. While living in Sarajevo, they will teach children English, inter-cultural communication, and media skills alongside students from the University of Sarajevo's education program.

  TESTIMONIES FROM SARAJEVO
  
Rachel Waldon  " My teaching partner Adnan took me to an adorable tea house where we sat and made our lesson plan on fruit salad and diversity.  One thing I really like is how we've stayed in touch with our co-teachers. Adnan and I still chat over Facebook. It's nice to know that, despite the distance, we've managed to stay close. "

Matt Schroeder  " I am living a nd teaching in Sarajevo full time, continuing to learn beyond the scope of the Bosnia Project. One of the most memorable experiences from the Bosnia Project was the ability to collaborate with international educators in a global setting, focusing on skills essential in today's connected society. The incredible o pportunity for immersion  in and exploration of a new culture and language shaped me as an educator and individual."

Bosnian students showing off their art.

Sonia Lunn  " Last summer we started identifying lessons that effectively teach the three dimensions of Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC): knowledge, skills and attitudes. The selected lessons will be included in a teaching portfolio developed by our local partners for education students at the University of Sarajevo. When completed, the portfolio will help integrate the student-centered teaching of ICC with the local community and education system.
 
T o study how the lessons went, we paired daily teacher observation forms with daily response notebooks from each student. The notebooks provided a wealth of data about student levels of ICC before and after each ICC-focused lesson. This methodology helped pinpoint specific lessons that can be tested and reproduced, rather than a more general impact evaluation. "  

CENTER FOR AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT cad
TWO BOOKS, ONE SEMESTER

CAD director Philip Roessler published two back-to-back books on power and conflict in Africa.  Why Comrades Go to War: Liberation Politics and the Outbreak of Africa's Deadliest Conflict , published by Oxford University Press, digs up the roots of Africa's Great War. The very next month Cambridge University Press released Professor Roessler's broader study of civil war in Sudan and beyond, 
Ethnic Politics and State Power in Africa: The Logic of the Coup-Civil War Trap . Both books epitomize the rigorous research and fruitful collaborations ITPIR strives to cultivate.  If you'd like to read more about the book launch lecture and celebration, The Flat Hat published an article on the evening .

Prof. Roessler flanked by posters of his book covers.

GLOBAL PATHWAYS global
  GLOBAL PATHWAYS RESEARCH LAB
  
The Global Pathways Research Lab began in Fall 2016 to expose students to IR literature from beyond the Global North and West. Under W&M Professor Sue Peterson and Global Pathways PI Wiebke Wemheuer-Vogelaar, four students meet weekly to study East Asian international relations. Several of the students are developing their own research paper with Global Pathway's unique dataset of Japanese and Chinese journal articles. 


BERLIN CONFERENCE
 
Researchers from Berlin, Nagoya, and Williamsburg gathered at the Freie Universitat in Berlin, Germany to kick off their collaboration funded by the German Science Foundation (DFG). Partners discussed strategies for effectively compiling information on the publishing behaviors of scholars in fourteen countries across the world, maintaining engaged student researchers, and planned for upcoming conferences. 

TRIPtrip
 TEACHING, RESEARCH, AND INTERNATIONAL POLICY
STUDENT SNAP POLL
 
TRIP Research Assistants are given the opportunity to act as Principal Investigators on an original Student Snap Poll. They design and field a survey to determine the opinions of the William & Mary student body on a number of topics. The survey ran from November 29 to December 6 and involved a variety of questions, including the 2016 presidential election, domestic politics, international politics, public health, education, Title IX, sexual assault, speech, and campus life. Below is one of the questions and a graph of results.

"How likely do you think it is that Donald Trump's administration 
will follow through with its promises for the following policies ?" 



INTERNATIONAL STUDIES ASSOCIATION
CONVENTION 2017
 
From left: Mike Tierney, Amy Oakes, Peter Marcus Kristensen,
Rachel Merriman-Goldring, and Susan Peterson.

Two TRIP RAs, Jack Hoagland and Rachel Merriman-Goldring, presented their work at the ISA Annual Convention in Baltimore. They were joined by  TRIP PIs Susan Peterson and Mike Tierney, PM Elizabeth Martin, JPM Hannah Petrie, and PIPS director Amy Oakes on the panel "Measuring the Changing Boundaries of the International Relations Discipline." Check out the paper titles below: 

"Mapping the International Security Subfield"
(Hoagland, Oakes, Peterson)

"Gender and the Expression of International 
Relations  Knowledge and Attitudes" 
(Merriman-Goldring, Peterson) 

"Disciplinary Incentives, Tenure, and Policy-Relevant 
Research in International Relations"
(Martin)


MEET THE '16-'17 TEAM

Back from left:  JPM Hannah Petrie,
Adam Illowsky,  Henry Crossman, Marc Dion.
Front: PM Elizabeth Martin, Marilyn Vaccaro, Leah Zweig, Alex Bate.
Back from left: Hannah Petrie, Remington Pool, Jack Nicol, 
Conor Scanlon.
Middle: Elizabeth Martin,  Amelia Koby, Matthew Ribar, Ola Pozor 
Front: Nicole Cook, Emily Jackson, Mackenzie Neal, Christen Scalfano

PIPS pips
 THE PROJECT ON INTERNATIONAL PEACE AND SECURITY
PIPS HIGHLIGHT REEL

William & Mary produced an amazing video for PIPS! The directors and students of PIPS illuminate the core purposes and values of the project, from the classroom to the briefing room and beyond. Click below to watch it on YouTube:



MEET THE '16-'17 RESEARCH FELLOWS
 


Back from left: Max Sterling, Mitchell Croom, Matthew Bondy
Front: Layla Abi-Falah, Hali Czosnek, Carolyn DeRoster, 
Haley Larson,  and senior research intern Sabrina Mayor.

The research fellows have been working hard all year to each produce a white paper. Every Friday the entire PIPS team converges for raucous, rigorous meetings, pooling their talents to help one another create cutting-edge scholarship. This year's projects cover topics ranging from the threat of internet "bots" on US national security to the need to secure bioengineering labs before a nightmare disease outbreak. Watch this space: a forthcoming newsletter will include links to all of the completed white papers.

SAVE THE DATES: 2017 SYMPOSIUMS

The annual PIPS symposiums are almost upon us. For the research fellows, briefing the academic and policy communities is the capstone of their year-long project. Discussants for each will be announced soon. 


April 7: W&M Symposium

April 12: DC Symposium
  
VIPCAT vipcat
VIOLENT INTRANATIONAL POLITICAL CONFLICT & TERRORISM
RETURN OF VIPCAT

In late January, Dr. Shellman briefed VIPCAT capabilities to various representatives from the Department of Homeland Security, Department of State, USAID, The Pacific Disaster Center, and members of the Joint Staff all stationed at the U.S. Southern Command. Presentations focused on text analysis, modeling and forecasting capabilities, and course of action analysis all focused on U.S. national security interests.
 
VIPCAT is currently looking to raise funding in order to undertake more student-faculty research that can serve interests in U.S. government with an eye on challenges related to the U.S. Southern Command and other U.S. Combatant Command. Dr. Shellman is sponsoring two freshman Monroe Scholars' research projects in summer 2017 in an effort to spur interest in VIPCAT and begin a track-record of new student-faculty research projects.


WELCOME, FULBRIGHT
 
From left: Dr. Shellman and Dr. Gomza.

VIPCAT sponsored Dr. Ivan Gomza for a Fulbright research project. Dr. Gomza studies contentious politics and political violence, specializing in French and Ukrainian politics, and is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (Kyiv, Ukraine). Though he holds a PhD in political science, he blends historical sociology, social constructivism, and political science methodologies to answer research questions. Current research projects include the study of populist authoritarianism and post-communist nostalgia in Ukraine, radicalization of Ukrainian nationalists in the interwar period, and uses and abuses of the idea of national decay by French nationalists. 

Dr. Shellman and Dr. Gomza are collaborating on a research project that empirically assesses the extent to which coercive surplus of legitimacy explains targets of militant attacks. The results could provide valuable insights into accurately forcasting the "what" and "where" of future insurgent attacks.

ABOUT ITPIR
William & Mary's Institute for the Theory & Practice of International Relations catalyzes collaborative, interdisciplinary research in international relations. Students work alongside faculty to produce policy-relevant scholarship and contribute to debates in international development, security, and academics.