Kerry will take a position at Yale overseeing the Kerry Inititive
Former Secretary of State John Kerry will serve as Yale’s first-ever Distinguished Fellow for Global Affairs. A 1966 graduate of Yale College, Kerry will return to his alma mater to oversee the Kerry Initiative, an interdisciplinary program that will tackle pressing global challenges through teaching, research, and international dialogue.
The alumnus will leverage insights, experiences, and relationships on a global scale to oversee the Kerry Initiative, collaborating with students and faculty from across the university and deepening the Yale experience to have greater interaction with the world beyond campus. In partnership with the Yale Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, the Kerry Initiative will advance Yale’s long tradition of preparing the next generation of world leaders.
Through the initiative, Kerry will partner with scholars from across Yale, applying their shared expertise to questions of global importance: failed and failing states and the challenge of authoritarian populism; rising sectarianism and violent extremism; climate change and other environmental threats; and capacity building, global economic opportunity, and development. Drawing on experience from his long and distinguished career, Kerry will convene and lead conversations among global stakeholders, both in New Haven and overseas, to develop new approaches to solving these crucial challenges.
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“I’m grateful to President Salovey for his enthusiasm about what we can do together as a Yale community and how we can empower the next generation of idealists and diplomats and activists to be a part of public service and a cause bigger than themselves,” Kerry said.
http://news.yale.edu/2017/02/16/secretary-john-kerry-66-joins-yale-distinguished-fellow-global-affairs
(This was announced a few weeks ago - and may have been on other places in DU, but I thought it should be on this board.)
From the Washington Post:
Most of the major problems that face society — such as climate change, violent extremism and failing states — need global solutions and an interdisciplinary approach, Salovey said. So Kerry will be pulling together experts from across many fields to think about those problems in new ways. It’s an educational platform, not a political one, he added.
The Kerry Initiative has several elements, said Jim Levinsohn, director of the Yale Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, which will work in partnership with the new initiative. Kerry will be speaking to classes in various schools such as Yale Law School, School of Management, Divinity School, School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, and the Jackson Institute. He’ll host conferences each year, probably one in New Haven and one elsewhere, to bring together scholars and other experts. And he’ll work with a team of undergraduate and graduate students, Kerry Fellows, who will help him with his writing and his research.
Kerry did not want to be a figurehead at Yale. “I just love the fact that he wants to be in a classroom environment, surrounded by our students,” Salovey said, “because I know their interactions with him are going to be illuminating and inspiring. I hope that’s the case for him as well, when he interacts with our students.”
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Said Levinsohn: “I very much hope next fall he will show up and give a talk in global affairs 101. Kids who are in high school as we speak will be seeing him in the classroom in the fall.”
https://2009-2017.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2017/01/267073.htm
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All I can say is that Yale kids able to sign up for his seminars and especially those whose research is mentored by him will be very lucky. Like many of the best scientists/intellectuals, Kerry has always been open to reconsider common wisdom and test alternative ideas - something most people stop doing very early in their careers. It is fitting that, in this new chapter, John Kerry will be mentoring people who may be leaders in a few decades. I think of David Wade's intense respect and the credit he gives JK for teaching him and the fact that JK always seemed to enjoy engaging with students.
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