Didzis Klavins, a Sylff fellowship recipient in 2012 while attending the University of Latvia, visited the Sylff Association secretariat in Tokyo on August 12, 2019. He is currently a Senior Researcher at the University of Latvia.

Didzis Klavins, right, with Tomoko Yamada of the Sylff Association secretariat.

Visiting Japan for the first time, Klavins attended the International Conference on Global Risk, Security, and Ethnicity, co-organized by the International Political Science Association and Nagasaki University. As a panelist for a session on “Emerging Technologies and New Perspectives on Risk and Security,” he made a presentation on “The Relationship of Innovation Diplomacy and Security in the Nordic and Baltic Countries.”

His academic interests include diplomacy, international organizations, and international relations, especially in the Baltic and Scandinavian countries. He is currently involved in a three-year research project funded by the EU that is examining the relationship between innovation diplomacy and security in those countries. The project involves several professors at different universities in the EU and focuses on three major subjects: diaspora diplomacy, innovation diplomacy, and digital diplomacy.

Klavins is actively engaged in researching these topics as well as in teaching at University of Latvia. We were happy to meet him in Tokyo and wish him much success in his academic pursuits.

The Sylff Association Secretariat is pleased to share news that Chika Ezeanya-Esiobu, a 2009–2011 PhD Sylff fellow at Howard University, has been named one of the world’s 100 Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) in the category of “Religious and Humanitarian” in 2019.

Chika Ezeanya-Esiobu

MIPAD’s mission is “to recognize the positive contributions made by people of African descent, worldwide” and to “build a progressive global network of civil society actors to join together and support the implementation of the International Decade for People of African Descent, 2015–2024, as proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 68/237 and now officially recognized by the African Union (AU).”

Ezeanya-Esiobu completed her PhD degree in African Development and Policy Studies at Howard University in 2011 before joining the faculty of the University of Rwanda, where she is currently a senior lecturer/researcher. As a Sylff fellow, she organized a workshop on leadership and character development for young Rwandans in 2016, funded by Sylff Leadership Initiatives (SLI).

She recently published Education and Indigenous Knowledge in Africa with the support of the International Development Research Center Canada, an open access book that has been very well received across universities and colleges in Africa. She is also being recognized beyond academia, appearing on a TED talk on “How Africa Can Use Its Traditional Knowledge to Make Progress.”

Congratulations on being named an influential global leader, and we wish her even greater success in her future endeavors.

Mio Morimoto, who was awarded a Sylff fellowship in 2019 by Waseda University, visited the Sylff Association secretariat on August 2. She is currently pursuing a PhD in educational development, and the theme of her dissertation is “Parental Involvement and Child Learning in Developing Countries: A Case Study on Elementary Education in India.”

She hopes to contribute to the improvement of basic education in developing countries, which she thinks is most important in enabling children to survive and rise above a difficult environment.

Morimoto, seated center, with Sylff Association secretariat members.

After completing her undergraduate studies at Waseda, she worked at the Kumon Institution of Education for about three years.

While continuing her doctoral research at Waseda University, she is visiting India for the sixth time between September and December 2019 for an internship at the UNICEF office in New Delhi, where she also hopes to gather data and network with local school officials and researchers. She feels that field work is very important in learning about key elementary education issues in India.

She has expressed her wish to apply for a Sylff Research Abroad grant so she can visit India again and network with Sylff fellows from Jadavpur University and Jawaharlal Nehru University. The Sylff Association secretariat looks forward to hearing from her and hopes that she will take full advantage of the various support programs and the global Sylff network to achieve her professional goals.

Grant Morris, a 1999–2000 PhD Sylff fellow at the University of Waikato in New Zealand, visited the Sylff Association Secretariat in Tokyo on Wednesday, July 10, 2019. He has been working at the Victoria University of Wellington since 2002, where he is currently an associate professor in law.

Grant (center) in conversation with the members of the Sylff Association secretariat

His main research areas are mediation, negotiation, and legal history, and he recently co-authored Mediation in New Zealand (Thomson Reuters, 2018), the first comprehensive scholarly treatment of mediation in the country. 

Morris was on his second visit to Tokyo after a 16-year hiatus, accompanying the New Zealand team that participated in the International Negotiation Competition, held at Sophia University in Tokyo. He was the coach of the NZ team, comprising students at his university, which placed sixth overall (with “trans-Tasman rivals” Australia coming in first).

After the competition he visited Kyoto, traveling from Tokyo by Shinkansen, which, he says “was the fastest and most efficient train I have ever travelled on!” In Kyoto he visited the new International Mediation Center, located at Doshisha University.

We are very pleased that he also dropped by the Sylff Association Secretariat, giving us a chance to introduce the many opportunities for additional support available for Sylff fellows. “It was great to visit the team at Sylff and discuss current projects. There is a lot of very exciting work being done,” he said.

Grant, center in the first row, during his visit to the Sylff Association secretariat

To our pleasant surprise, we also learned during our conversation that he has very strong links to the Sylff community. His wife was a Sylff fellow at the Victoria University of Wellington, and one of his students, Jennifer Moore, was also a fellow who recently received an SLI grant to improve medical injury responses.

We hope that he will come back to Tokyo often to strengthen his ties with the Association.

In this series, the final presentations of all 20 participants of Sylff Leaders Workshop are introduced as five news articles (with links to the summaries of four fellows each).

The spring session of Sylff Leaders Workshop 2018-19 was held from April 7 to 14, 2019, in Beppu, Oita, with the generous support of Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University. It brought together the 20 Sylff fellows from 20 countries—selected from among 114 applicants—who had participated in the fall session in Sasayama. The workshop was aimed at deepening fellows’ understanding of differences in values and perspectives and held on the topic of the “Future of Food Production in 2030.”

The participating fellows made final presentations during the closing session on April 11 covering one or more of the following topics: (1) self-introduction, (2) changes in values, perspectives, or ideas experienced during the course of the two workshop sessions, (3) how the world is likely to change by 2030, and (4) the kind of leader you see yourself as being now or aspire to become in 2030.

This article introduces the presentations of the following four fellows:

(Clockwise from upper left)Ronya Foy Connor, Rosangela Malachias, Andrew Prosser, and Nuruddeen Mohammed Suleiman.

Ronya Foy Connor
Rosangela Malachias
Andrew Prosser
Nuruddeen Mohammed Suleiman

In this series, the final presentations of all 20 participants of Sylff Leaders Workshop are introduced as five news articles (with links to the summaries of four fellows each).

The spring session of Sylff Leaders Workshop 2018-19 was held from April 7 to 14, 2019, in Beppu, Oita, with the generous support of Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University. It brought together the 20 Sylff fellows from 20 countries—selected from among 114 applicants—who had participated in the fall session in Sasayama. The workshop was aimed at deepening fellows’ understanding of differences in values and perspectives and held on the topic of the “Future of Food Production in 2030.”

The participating fellows made final presentations during the closing session on April 11 covering one or more of the following topics: (1) self-introduction, (2) changes in values, perspectives, or ideas experienced during the course of the two workshop sessions, (3) how the world is likely to change by 2030, and (4) the kind of leader you see yourself as being now or aspire to become in 2030.

This article introduces the presentations of the following four fellows:

(Clockwise from upper left)Susan Rachel Banki, Nomingerel Davaadorj, Maria Adelasia Divona, and Jennifer Dysart.

Susan Rachel Banki
Nomingerel Davaadorj
Maria Adelasia Divona
Jennifer Dysart

In this series, the final presentations of all 20 participants of Sylff Leaders Workshop are introduced as five news articles (with links to the summaries of four fellows each).

The spring session of Sylff Leaders Workshop 2018-19 was held from April 7 to 14, 2019, in Beppu, Oita, with the generous support of Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University. It brought together the 20 Sylff fellows from 20 countries—selected from among 114 applicants—who had participated in the fall session in Sasayama. The workshop was aimed at deepening fellows’ understanding of differences in values and perspectives and held on the topic of the “Future of Food Production in 2030.”

The participating fellows made final presentations during the closing session on April 11 covering one or more of the following topics: (1) self-introduction, (2) changes in values, perspectives, or ideas experienced during the course of the two workshop sessions, (3) how the world is likely to change by 2030, and (4) the kind of leader you see yourself as being now or aspire to become in 2030.

This article introduces the presentations of the following four fellows:

(Clockwise from upper left)Kabira Namit, Anna Plater-Zyberk, Nermeen Varawalla, and Trisia Angela Farrelly.

Kabira Namit
Anna Plater-Zyberk
Nermeen Varawalla
Trisia Angela Farrelly

On July 16, 2019, a conference on “Gender-Based Violence against Women in Jordan: Rethinking Social, Legal, and Healthcare Services” was held at the University of Jordan. This one-day conference was organized by Dr. Tayseer Abu Odeh (Sylff fellow 2007, University of Jordan), with the support of a Sylff Leadership Initiatives grant.

Abu Odeh, second from right, moderating Panel Four of the conference.

Among the prominent Jordanian and other figures invited as speakers included Minister of Justice Bassam Talhouni; former Minister of Culture and a leading human rights lawyer Asma Khader; Jordanian Senator Taghreed Hikmet, who was the first woman judge in Jordan and the first woman judge at the International Criminal Tribunal from an Arab country; former Senator Raeda Qutob, who served as secretary general for the Higher Population Council and the National Council for Family Affairs; keynote speaker Asmahan Wadi, a consultant and researcher at the Arab State Regional Office of UNFPA Palestine; and Secretary General of the Jordanian National Commission for Women in Jordan Salma Nims.

The auditorium was packed with students and professionals from such sectors as law, civil society, healthcare, government, and academia. They engaged in lively and in-depth discussions on practical measures to stop violence against women.

The impact of the conference will hopefully continue to be felt long after the event, leading eventually to fundamental changes in Jordanian society. Congratulations to Abu Odeh on organizing this important forum with so many illustrious participants, and we look forward to receiving and uploading his report on the website soon.

The audience waits for the start of the conference at the Rum Auditorium of the University of Jordan.