I had the great pleasure to study abroad in Copenhagen, Denmark in the fall of 2016, in part due to scholarships awarded me by the college. To that point, I had never left the United States before — but what a time it was to do so. I had long been fascinated by the European integration project, and that project was reeling from some of its greatest shocks in modern history: recovery from the Eurozone debt crisis, managing a large-scale migration crisis, reconsidering relations with Russia following the annexation of Crimea, and dealing with the fallout from Brexit.
The experience was crucial to my later pursuits. Upon return from Copenhagen, I wrote (or at least tried to write) an undergraduate thesis on these various crises. After graduation, I would briefly teach English in France before attending graduate school at the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where I studied international economics, international law, and European security. At Fletcher, I had the great pleasure to study and work for leading minds in European and global security issues such as Chris Miller (author of Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology), former German Ambassador to the United States Klaus Scharioth, and former U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Legal Counsel Michael Glennon. It was these opportunities that led to further opportunities in the form of a research fellowship with the NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Brussels and working for an aerospace and defense consulting firm in Washington, D.C.
“My experience studying abroad — and the St. Olaf funding that allowed it — provided me the stepping stones needed to get my foot in the door regarding both career and graduate school. I will always be deeply, deeply appreciative of that chance, and fully believe my life would be very different without having had it.”
Although I have moved away from the international affairs space to pursue my entrepreneurial ambitions here in Minnesota, my experience studying abroad — and the St. Olaf funding that allowed it — provided me the stepping stones needed to get my foot in the door regarding both career and graduate school. I will always be deeply, deeply appreciative of that chance, and fully believe my life would be very different without having had it.
The picture above is of me with my fellow NATO Parliamentary Assembly researchers (hailing from the U.S., France, Germany, and Turkey) at NATO headquarters in Brussels during an emergency meeting of the Ukranian delegation to NATO days before Russia’s invasion.