The Kozmetsky Center

David Cole is the John Carroll Research Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center, where he teaches constitutional law, national security and criminal justice. Professor Cole has litigated cases before the Supreme Court and has written six books, most recently His most The Torture Memos: Rationalizing the Unthinkable (2009), which, according to Democracy Now!’s interview with Cole, shows “that the United States government’s top attorneys were instrumental in rationalizing acts of torture and cruelty, employing chillingly twisted logic and Orwellian reasoning to authorize what the law absolutely forbids” (click here to see the video). See his page for more information on Professor Cole. This visit was co-sponsored by the Kozmetsky Center of Excellence in Global Finance and the Center for Ethics and Leadership.

We want to thank those who attended his lecture and interacted with him while he was here. We look forward to many more events in Fall 2012!

“My experience with Liz Gibbons as my mentor has greatly influenced me. While she was at St. Edward’s, I was able to meet with her and talk about my future plans. She also told me a lot about her experiences abroad, in UNICEF, and now at Harvard. It truly helped shape my travel plans this summer and for after I graduate. This summer, I will head to Uganda for two weeks with Campus Ministry and Liz gave me a lot of advice on what to expect and people to talk to while I’m there. I am also going to Geneva to study this summer, and Liz is graciously setting me up with some of her colleagues from the UN headquarters. She talked through my issues with finding a focus for my career path. She also talked to me about a future at the UN and what that would look like. Her stories and advice were priceless in helping me plan for the future. I am so grateful that the Kozmetsky Center gave me this opportunity to meet and work with Liz. She is an extremely intelligent, kind and inspirational person and it is truly an honor to know her. I realize that my relationship with Liz will not only help me with my career goals, but with growth as a person as well.”

- Monique Sandhu, sophomore, Global Studies major

Our Distinguished Visiting Fellow from Fall 2012 Diana Liverman spoke at the Planet Under Pressure Conference in London a few weeks ago. Here is the link to see her talk.

Diana will also be speaking at the Climate Adaptation Conference in Arizona in a few weeks. If anyone is interested in going, check out the conference page here.

Don’t forget her page for St. Edward’s students can be found at this webpage.

If you are interested in the transcript from Liz Gibbon’s talk over “Public Policy in the Best Interest of the Child,” click here to see the document.

Liz Gibbons two week visit on campus was enlightening for students and community members alike. Her public talk highlighted the issues on protecting children’s rights and how to accurately respond to violations. Her public speech, “Public Policy in the Best Interest of the Child,” was not only informative, educational, and inspirational, but she transcended speech-making by challenging the students to contact local legislators to make protecting children our first priority. She inspired others to take action in preventing children’s rights violations all over the world, including our own backyard.

Liz expanded on her lengthy and distinguished career at UNICEF, where she was the Director of Operations in Haiti and Guatemala before becoming the Chief of Global Policy. Her experiences abroad pinned the importance of legislation for children around the world, and how the lack of international support leads to disastrous rippling effects. For example, the Convention on the Rights of the Child has been signed and ratified by all countries in the UN except for Somalia - and the United States. Liz explained how this is in important factor in the well-being of children.

Liz was able to connect with 589 SEU community members during her time here. She was able to meet with students and further discuss empowering the youth of today with strategies that include creating “agents of change” - using education and psychosocial care to rehabilitate victims to help fellow survivors of children’s rights violations. In one of Liz’s presentations, she said, “A holistic approach needs to be taken when working with children – this involves considering them as whole human beings first and foremost, rather than fragmenting their lives into ‘problems’ or separate roles – e.g. a working child, a disabled child or a refugee child. It also means recognizing that achieving a positive change in one area (e.g. access to school) may require work in other areas too (e.g. income generation or improved health care).”

We at The Kozmetsky Center, as well as the students and faculty who made Liz’s stay so enjoyable, thank you for your interest and involvement!

Earlier this year, visiting scholar Robert Shetterly was interviewed by Austin’s KLRU. Our own Elisa Diaz was also featured, as well as St. Edward’s students who participated in the self-portrait workshop with Mr. Shetterly. You can see the interview below:

The Kozmetsky Center’s Distinguished Visiting Fellow for Spring 2012 is Elizabeth Gibbons, former UNICEF Chief of Global Policy and Deputy Director, Policy and Practice and Associate Director of Gender, Rights and Civic Engagement in UNICEF’s New York headquarters, as well as the head of the UNICEF offices in Haiti and Guatemala. After an impressive and lengthy career at UNICEF, Elizabeth Gibbons is now a visiting scientist at the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights in the Harvard School of Public Health.    

Her specialty in children’s rights has created the unique opportunity for us at St. Edward’s and in the Austin community to learn about initiatives and practices in human rights with a specific focus on children’s rights and their livelihoods. This week, Elizabeth Gibbons has met with students, faculty, and community members to address these issues. On Wednesday the 21st, we held a community luncheon that was based on policies of children’s rights. Community members were able to brainstorm and have an interactive discussion with problems they have faced in their workplaces. Elizabeth Gibbons has also visited classes including Global Issues and Gender & Globalization and made a visit to the Con Mi Madre students at Bedichek Elementary.

Elizabeth Gibbons will be having a public talk next week, March 29th at 7pm in Jones Auditorium. She will be speaking about “Public Policy in the Best Interests of the Child.”

In Spring 2012, we will welcome to Campus Liz Gibbons as the Kozmetsky Distinguished Visiting Fellow. Liz has had a long and distinguished career at UNICEF where she has been Regional Program Policy Advisor (Haiti) at UNICEF and Deputy Director, Policy and Practice and Associate Director, Gender, Right and Civic Engagement Section at UNICEF.

I am fortunate enough to have been chosen to be a Kozmetsky Faculty Fellow to work closely with Liz during her time on campus and, by email and telephone for the year.

This is a special privilege for me because I am the faculty expert for the UNPG CULF workshops in Spring.  Our theme is the Millennium Development Goals and children.  Liz and I have consulted on reading materials for the interns on this course and we look forward to welcoming her to speak at some of our workshops.  As this course is honed, we have been asking Liz for advice and references.

Also, I am delighted to be collaborating with Liz on a new course which I am teaching in Spring – Politics and Law of Human Rights.  This is an area of particular interest for me and Liz has spoken about Human Rights and the MDGs and, in a former position with UNICEF, directed UNICEF’s global human rights advocacy, increasing visibility of children in poverty-reduction policy dialogue, human rights bodies and debates.

By bringing Liz Gibbons to campus the Kozmetsky Center will enrich the lives of many of our students and I am delighted to be part of this initiative.

Kay Firth-Butterfield

We want to commend the following St. Edward’s students for competing in the Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation: Tools to Change the World competition and to attending the conference held last week.

The following students were part of the competition:

Thomas Hannsz
Mary Watt
Diana Lopez
Rebecca Ikard
William Haynes
Chris Albury
Natalie Bisheh
Mollie Winston
Kevin Fitzpatrick
Cindy Mora
Ryan Duplantis
Corina Solis
Brenda Sanchez
Carolina Molina
Charles Davila
Nikolai Solow
Nick Mckinney
Cody Hightower
Patrick Krispin
Rachel Romero
Michael Slavik
Stephanie Sepulveda
Kelli Austin
Curran Guiney
Carolina Carmona
Edgar Umana
Monique Sandhu
Katie Robichaux

Your involvement and ideas are greatly appreciated! Their ideas are up for the international contest, the Dell Social Innovation Challenge (dellchallenge.org).

We also want to thank our panel of speakers and judges for an enlightening conference.

Pictures of our most recent visitor, Robert Shetterly, are now available for viewing on our facebook page.

Guests had the opportunity to leave a comment in a journal next to the exhibit. A few of the remarks are as follows:

“Important, touching, and needed.”

“These images and words, the way they are depicted, gave great honor to the people who have made leaps in thought possible. A great measure to inspire other great thoughts and ideas, implementing and incubating progressive thought. Thank you for sharing.”

“So powerful! Thank you for your talent, passion and courage.”

We appreciate all who took part in making Robert’s visit so enjoyable. We would love to hear feedback or thoughts on the visit and about what you would like to see in the future!