Above photo: The St. Petersburg Conference on World Affairs was co-founded in 2013 by Dr. Thomas Smith and Ambassador Douglas L. McElhaney. Last year the conference brought in around 2,000 people over three days. Courtesy of Abigail Payne
By Michael Moore Jr.
Students can expect a different experience at this year’s annual conference on international affairs:
More focus on social issues, a student career forum and free lunch.
“Students are the future leaders of the United States,” said Alfredo Anthony, a retired lieutenant colonel who served for 21 years as a career military intelligence officer. “We have to make sure the youth gets a head start.”
Anthony is the moderator of a panel titled “What on earth are U.S. troops doing in Africa?” at the sixth annual St. Petersburg Conference on World Affairs, which will be held Tuesday through Friday at the USF St. Petersburg.
More than 2,000 people are expected to attend the conference, and they will hear from more than 70 diplomats, professors and business executives on nearly 40 panels.
That’s a significant increase from 2013, when former ambassador Douglas L. McElhaney and political science professor Thomas Smith put on a one-day, 10 panel conference at the old Salvador Dali museum, now Harbor Hall.
The event drew roughly 200 people.
Now, there will be multiple panels going on at the same time, and the conference will be in two different locations on campus — the University Student Center and the auditorium in the Kate Tiedemann College of Business.
McElhaney is pleased with the growth.
“People are always amazed at what they don’t know about the world,” he said. “What we really try to do is give out information and provide an international perspective.”
The conference is free and open to the public. According to Diane Seligsohn, who is in her first year as president of the organization after McElhaney retired, there is a considerable increase in the percentage of women speakers this year.
Among the speakers at the conference will be the president of the National Organization of Women, Toni Van Pelt, who grew up in Pinellas County and went to Seminole High School.
Van Pelt will be on the panels “Should we foist our concept of human rights on others?” and “Is this a watershed moment for relations between the sexes?” and will be visiting political science professor Judithanne McLauchlan’s women and law class Thursday from 12:15-12:45 in LPH 214.
Van Pelt said she hopes that the things we are experiencing in the world today will help change the culture by shaping a world that “further respects the rights of women.”
Pollster John Zogby, who sits on panels such as “Why pollsters fail to predict election outcomes” and “Breaking news: ‘We interrupt this conference to bring you the latest…,’” says we are in the middle of a generational and technological shift.
“We’re in the middle of it and it’s painful because it feels like it’s taking forever, but it’s painful because it is moving so quickly,” Zogby said. “We’re looking at global problems that can’t be solved by an assembly in Luxembourg, let alone a congress in the United States.”
In addition to the panels, this year’s conference will see a few new features, such as a keynote speech by retired ambassador Thomas Pickering at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, book talks and the aforementioned student career forum called “So you want to work overseas? How to launch an international career,” which will be held Feb. 21 at 2:05 p.m. in the College of Business auditorium.
In addition to the career forum, there will be free student luncheons with the CIA, State Department and Peace Corps.
Golfo Alexopoulos, history professor and director of the USF Institute on Russia, urges students to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the conference.
“Your education extends well beyond the classroom,” she said. “You’re not getting as much out of your college education if you don’t attend these things.”
Alexopoulos, who will be sitting on the “Are China and Russia today’s expansionist powers?” panel, said she didn’t start going to events like this until later in her college career, but thinks that student should get a head start while they can.
“If you go through your college years and you only go to class, you’re wasting your money,” she said.
