Anduela Nika Johnson

2022 Biodefense Grad Matthew Ferreira Wins Hopkins’ Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Fellowship

Andrew J Schappert — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 20:06:43 +0000

2022 Biodefense Grad Matthew Ferreira Wins Hopkins’ Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Fellowship Andrew J Schappert Wed, 02/15/2023 - 15:06

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Matthew Ferreira: ‘[T]he opportunity to meet and learn from classmates in the various biodefense, policy and government, and public administration programs was incredibly enriching and invaluable.’

Matthew Ferreira, a 2022 graduate of the Schar School’s Master’s in Biodefense program, has been selected as a 2023 Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative (ELBI) fellow at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health and Security. The 31 fellows in the 2023 class, the program’s 10th, were chosen from some 227 applicants from around the world after a rigorous selection process.

“I am so excited to be accepted into the ELBI Fellowship program,” Ferreira said. “I am looking forward to meeting and connecting with the others in the Fellowship class as well as alumni of the program. Many of the professionals and scholars that I have had the pleasure to work with have participated in ELBI, so I’m honored to have the chance to meet and learn from this cohort of diverse and talented people in the coming year.”

His experience in the biodefense program contributed greatly to his professional growth, he said.

“The coursework has allowed me to better implement my current knowledge in the environment of government service and national security work. Additionally, the opportunity to meet and learn from classmates in the various biodefense, policy and government, and public administration programs was incredibly enriching and invaluable.”

Ferreira is the director of operations for Soteria Solutions, an Arlington, Virginia-based firm that provides innovative solutions to complex logistics problems, with a specific focus on crisis-affected areas. He previously served as an American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the State Department where he worked directly on international COVID-19 response operations, global health, and biodefense.

The ELBI program is an opportunity for talented career professionals to deepen their expertise, expand their network, and build their leadership skills through a series of sponsored events coordinated by the Hopkins center. The fellowship boasts more than 250 alumni who come from government, defense, private industry, science, law, public health, medicine, global health, journalism, the social sciences, and academia.

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Schar School News February 2023

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Meet the MPA Student Who Leads FEMA’s National Exercise Division

Andrew J Schappert — Fri, 03 Feb 2023 14:29:19 +0000

Meet the MPA Student Who Leads FEMA’s National Exercise Division Andrew J Schappert Fri, 02/03/2023 - 09:29

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Shawn Lenore: ‘I think there are a lot of benefits to on-the-job training experience, but I don’t think that should substitute for continuing to do formal education.’ Photo provided.

Shawn Lenore has literally dodged a bullet. Many of them. The retired Army senior noncommissioned officer with more than 20 years of service—a good part of it serving in Iraq—eventually found calmer work after his active-duty career. The culmination being his final assignment on presidential support duty at the White House Military Office and now working within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Action seems to find him anyway: As director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) National Exercise Division (NED), Lenore leads the National Exercise Program (NEP), a two-year cycle of exercises across the nation that assesses, examines, and validates the nation’s core capabilities to prevent, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate hazards such as hurricanes, wildland fires, pandemics, complex coordinated terrorist attacks, cyberattacks and other disasters, through superior preparedness exercises.

Busy enough? Not for him: He’s also a student at ��ӽ紫ý’s Schar School of Policy and Government as a member of the Master of Public Administration (MPA) program, attending classes at night.

NED, he explained, administers the NEP on behalf of the federal government and helps assists the nation in enhancing its preparedness and resilience for threats and hazards by designing and delivering exercises at federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial levels of government and throughout the whole community, focused on testing and validating all hazards policies, plans, and procedures.

Exercises are a key component of national preparedness as they provide the whole community with the opportunity to shape planning, assess, and validate core capabilities and address areas for improvement and, when properly leveraged, can mitigate and reduce the loss of life and property.

It’s a big job and, Lenore said, a continuation of his devotion to public service and serving others. His MPA degree, he added, will enhance his public policy and organizational leadership skills, and support his continual professional development goals.

“I will become a lot more informed from an academic and theory perspective,” he said. “I believe you should never be satisfied. I think there are a lot of benefits to on-the-job training experience, but I don’t think that should substitute for continuing to do formal education.”

His Schar School experience is already paying off.

“Last semester, I took a government contracting class as a challenge to myself and that one was very beneficial in understanding not just the theory but the real-world application on government contracting,” he said.

Lenore has a clear thirst for knowledge and need to constantly challenge himself, be it in the field or in academia. The Schar School is providing him with the right platform to maximize his professional pursuits.

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Symposium: The Arctic and International Security

Andrew J Schappert — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 14:39:47 +0000

Symposium: The Arctic and International Security Andrew J Schappert Mon, 10/24/2022 - 10:39

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When one thinks about the Arctic, what comes to mind is a cold and faraway world. But in fact, the Arctic has gotten hotter—not just temperature-wise (blame climate change) but also politically, environmentally, economically, and in matters of national security.

The Center for Security Policy Studies (CSPS) at the Schar School of Policy and Government will examine each of these topics during the Fifth Annual Symposium on International Security, held at ��ӽ紫ý’s Mason Square in Arlington, Virginia, on Thursday, October 27, from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. The event is open to all; lunch will be provided. Registration is required at this site.

CSPS director Ellen Laipson, who also leads the Schar School’s international security program, explains how the changes in the Arctic will affect the economy, the demographic, and security at large.

“The rules of the Arctic will have to be reset,” she said. “It will have economic ramifications and national security implications” as the region’s previously unnavigable polar seas become viable.

The symposium will present three panel discussions and a lunch-break conversation. Panelists include experts in the fields of climate change, national security, economics, and other relevant topics. Perhaps most important, they will bring into focus why the world should be concerned.

The three panel discussions are:

How the Arctic Is Changing: Environment, Geography, and Governance

Panelists:

Erin Sikorsky, Schar School faculty member and director of the Center for Climate and Security
Marisol Maddox, Polar Institute of the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars
Eugenie Punitcherska, Embassy of Canada

Moderator:

Schar School Associate Professor Todd Laporte

International Economic Dimensions of the Arctic

Panelists:

Lawson Brigham, University of Alaska Fairbanks and Polar Institute of the Wilson Center
Richard Kauzlarich, Schar School Distinguished Visiting Professor
Lucy Duncan, Safe Ports

Moderator:

Schar School Associate Professor Ken Reinert

The International Security Picture

Panelists:

Dave Auerswald, National War College
Doyle Hodges, Texas National Security Review
Rebecca Pincus, Polar Institute of the Wilson Center

Moderator:

Schar School Professor Ellen Laipson

Schar School Professor Mark N. Katz and Russia expert Andrey Toporov will discuss the Arctic and the U.S.-Russian relations during a lunchtime conversation.

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Schar School News October 2022

Kiera Hall: Meet the MPA Student Who Founded a PAC to Help Marginalized Candidates

Andrew J Schappert — Thu, 20 Oct 2022 13:15:28 +0000

Kiera Hall: Meet the MPA Student Who Founded a PAC to Help Marginalized Candidates Andrew J Schappert Thu, 10/20/2022 - 09:15

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Kiera Hall: ‘Local elections can be more expensive than senate elections. It is a very broken system.’

Kiera Hall is not the typical political operative. But based on her recent success and her determination to continue it, the Schar School Master’s in Public Administration student clearly means business.

Hall, 29, is the founding executive director of Commonwealth Forward, a nimble and narrowly focused political action committee (PAC) devoted to fighting “the corrosive effects of corporate influence on our domestic process,” according to its mission statement, and supporting progressive campaigns throughout Virginia. Those would-be civic leaders include many who are marginalized by the traditional institutions that recruit and support candidates.

In the last year, Hall has raised more than $1.6 million for the cause.

While busy trying to raise donations and helping candidates all over Virginia win elections, she is also pursuing her master’s degree in public administration, which teaches the skills and insights the executive director of a PAC will need.

“Yes, I said to myself, this degree is just right for me. Folks in public administration want the world to be a better place, and that is the place for me,” she said.

Hall has been putting her focus not on the “big guys” of politics, she said, but on young candidates who want to run on the local level, who stand up to corruption and fight for racial, environmental, and economic justice.

”Money is a barrier to entry in politics,” she said. “Local elections can be more expensive than senate elections. It is a very broken system. It can cost more than $1 million to run for local elections.”

Fundraising is not an easy job, but Hall is committed to become a big player in the world of “smaller” local candidates whose offices are no less important than the high-profile seats of power. She also knows very well her weak points and knows how to mend them: With knowledge, which is what brought her to the Schar School.

The Schar School’s highly ranked MPA program, she said, is teaching her “how to manage people, how to be a better leader, how to do accounting for an NGO [nongovernment organization], how to run a board of directors.”

In one of her classes, she literally took the budget proposal of the professor and applied it to her organization. It worked like a charm, she reported.

Hall seems to have found her niche and her appetite for knowledge satiated at Schar School. “The best professors are there and within reach,” she said, and when she needs to learn more, “I will come back.”

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Schar School News October 2022

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Panelists Answer the Question, ‘Is Taiwan Ready for War?’

Andrew J Schappert — Wed, 12 Oct 2022 17:27:19 +0000

Panelists Answer the Question, ‘Is Taiwan Ready for War?’ Andrew J Schappert Wed, 10/12/2022 - 13:27

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Michael Hunzeker

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Schar School Associate Professor Michael Hunzeker, right, introduces the ‘Is Taiwan Ready for War?’ panel. Photo by Buzz McClain/Schar School of Policy and Government

China’s recent aggressive actions toward Taiwan have raised questions as to the readiness of the island nation to defend itself with its existing military. A capacity audience attended a special afternoon panel discussion on Tuesday, October 11, addressing that existential threat hosted by the Schar School of Policy and Government’s Center for Security Policy Studies at Mason Square. The title was simply “Is Taiwan Ready for War?”

Schar School Associate Professor Michael Hunzeker moderated the discussion. Panelists included former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development Elbridge Colby; Taiwan-based journalist and research fellow at the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation Paul Huang; Lieutenant Colonel (Ret.) James Huang, a Taiwan-based defense commentator and former officer in the Republic of China (Taiwan) Army; and Senior Fellow, Codirector of the East Asia Program, and Director of the China Program at the Stimson Center Yun Sun.

At the moment, Taiwan has “zero deployment, [zero] use of drones for any army artillery, [zero] armor, and [zero] mechanized infantry units. It has serious logistic shortcomings and poor readiness,” said Paul Huang. In the last five years, some 16,000 volunteers have left the military, he added.
Budget cuts also harm the defense capabilities. James Huang noted that the Taiwanese military was always small and hardly mighty, but has gone “from bad to worse. We have to rob Peter to pay Paul for almost everything.”
Why Taiwan needs to be ready to defend itself against Chinese control is important to the U.S., Colby noted. “If Taiwan is left to itself, it is gone,” he said, adding, “The best way to draw American aid is for Taiwan to be ready to fight hard and effectively.”

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Schar School News October 2022