The East-West Center Association Blog

CHAPTER DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE

QUARTERLY REPORTS, EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETING ON APRIL 18, 2013

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED BY:  Estrella Besinga Sybinsky

ALOHA TO ALL OF OUR US AND INTERNATIONAL CHAPTERS!

For all of the chapters that responded, we extend our deep appreciation for your chapter responses.  We continue to have faith that other chapters will soon follow with their reports for the next Quarterly Executive Board Meeting.

The following chapters and chapter leaders responded:  1)  ASDP Chapter (Jessica  Sheetz-Nguyen)  2)  Bali Chapter (Anak Agung Gde Muninjaya)  3)  Brisbane & Virtual Australia (Iraphne Childs, Leader & Karen Reid Nunan, Secretary))  4)  Hanoi Chapter (Hoang Hoe)  5)  Hawaii Chapter (Carl Hefner)  6) Lahore Chapter (Arfa Zehra) 7)  Laos Chapter (Chantavong Saignasith)  8)  Mumbai Chapter (Sarosh Bana)  9) Nepal (Nirendra Maske)  10)  Okinawa Chapter (Keiko Yamazato) 11) Philippines Chapter (Ramon Clarete and Pauline Bautista) 12)  Singapore Chapter (Seng Seok Hoon)  13)  Southern CA Chapter (Claire Langham Richmond)  14) Tokyo Chapter (Yasukata Yano (current) & Shigeo Tonoike (past))  15) Washington D.C. Chapter (Jacob Dowd). Continue Reading »

As an East-West Center alumna/alumnus you are among over 60,000 people who have shared an experience as a student or professional conference/exchange participant engaging with your counterparts from the Asia-Pacific region, the United States and beyond.

As the East-West Center looks toward the future, we would like to capture the impact your East-West Center experience has had on your professional and personal life.

Could you please take a few minutes and respond to a short questionnaire? The link to the questionnaire is https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/EWC_Alumni_Feedback. Please submit your responses by May 3, 2013. We plan to use the combined answers to help us with our strategic planning and also to share with members of the US Congress and others who support our programs.

Thank you in advance for your time.

Senator Daniel K. Inouye

United States Senator Daniel K. Inouye, World War II veteran, Medal of Honor recipient and Hawaii’s senior Senator, passed away from respiratory complications on December 17th at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. He passed away peacefully with his wife and son beside him.
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By APLP Fellows Loan T. Le from Vietnam and Amir Ramin from Afghanistan

(EWC Alumna Tin Myaing Thein, Executive Director of the Pacific Gateway Center, speaks about the problem of human trafficking. Immigration attorney Grace Michiko Nowicki (R) addressed the related legal issues.)

HONOLULU – On November 14, six fellows from the East-West Center’s Asia-Pacific Leadership Program (APLP), collaborated with the Pacific and Asian Affairs Council (PAAC) and the Pacific Gateway Center (PGC) in hosting the event, “Human Trafficking in Asia and the Pacific: Current Challenges and Future Prospects.” It was held at the Pacific Gateway Center’s headquarters in the Lemongrass Café in downtown Honolulu.
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EWC international fellows take home lessons from the storm

Christina Monroe, EWC Education Project Specialist & Asia Pacific Leadership Program alumna

(APLP fellows in NYC during Hurricane Sandy witness resilience of the American people.)

It seemed the worst place to be on Oct 29^th, but for fellows trying to understand America, New York City was the perfect spot.
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Jefferson Fellowships alumnus and Business India Executive Editor Sarosh Bana has shared the following essay arguing that current territorial disputes in the East and South China Seas highlight the need for a region-wide security structure to lay the foundations of overall peace and stability in the Asia Pacific:

Towards an Asia Pacific Alliance

by Sarosh Bana

Coincidentally or not, China’s maritime disputes with its neighbours have been gaining global attention ever since US President Barack Obama’s announcement in January of his country’s “pivot” strategy in the Asia-Pacific.

The ominous developments are posing a threat to this fastest growing economic region in the world and its vital waterways, confounding diplomatic efforts, rousing hostilities and heralding a geopolitical power struggle between the world’s two leading economies of the US and China. Continue Reading »

(EWC alumni Haiming Wen, Yue Cui, and James Rae pose next to the poster about the EWC presentation.)

The EWCA Beijing Chapter held a presentation about the East-West Center in late October at China Foreign Affairs University (CFAU), a leading institution affiliated with China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs that provides training for international careers related to diplomacy, business, and law.
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Pre-authorized Debit Program for Your Donation

Would you like to see more students come to the East-West Center to take advantage of opportunities such as those you had?

Here is a simple, painless way to make that happen.  You can now have your donations to the East-West Center Foundation automatically debited or deducted from your checking or savings accounts each quarter.  This option is only available for U.S. bank accounts.

If you decide to have $90 taken from your bank account (savings or checking) every quarter (that’s $1 a day), you will have given $360 in a year, and in less than three years, you will have given $1,000!  Your name will go on a donor plaque at Burns Hall as a $1,000 Donor.  If you must discontinue the program before you reach $1,000, you can just notify the EWC Foundation office.

Sign up by going to the EWC Foundation website www.eastwestcenter.org/support-the-ewc, contacting the EWC Foundation at 808-944-7193 or by email Foundation@EastWestCenter.org

Sounds easy?  It is!  Some of us have already started on the Quarterly Debit Program.  Please join us today.  Thank you for your participation and generosity.

Larry Smith, co-chair

Tsue Ostermann, co-chair

EWCA Endowment Fund for Student Scholarships Committee

The East-West Center has become the first educational institution to receive a Hawai‘i Green Business and Green Government Award, which recognizes organizations for outstanding effort in improving their environmental footprint. This year’s awards were presented by Gov. Neil Abercrombie to the EWC and seven other organizations at a Hawai‘i Clean Energy Day event at the state Capitol on April 20.

Hawai'i Gov. Neil Abercrombie presents the Green Business Award to EWC Sustainability Task Force members Kris Thompson, Jiwnath Ghimire and Melissa Finucane.

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The East-West Center is glad to announce the launch of the new EWC Community at http://www.EastWestCommunity.org/alumni.  Membership and access to the community is exclusive and free to EWC Alumni and Associate members only. The purpose of the online community is to help members network and share information with each other.

If you were already registered in the previous EWC Online Community, then please check your email for instructions on how to log in.

If you are a first-time visitor, you can register at http://www.EastWestCommunity.org/alumni.

We hope that you will find the EWC Community useful for keeping in touch with friends and colleagues from the East-West Center.

If you have any comments or concerns, please email us at alumni@eastwestcenter.org.

Aloha and Mahalo for your kind attention,
EWC Associates Office