week three...

Hi all! Week three is going pretty well. We had a session Monday morning on Capitol Hill, which was interesting. Since Congress approves all funding for the state department, we're basically learning how to most effectively communicate with them (both in DC and abroad) in a way that will help them understand what we need.

Yesterday we had a really interesting history session (yes, can you believe I used those two words in the same sentence?). We did an activity where we were assigned a visa case to decide, but we were working within the framework of the American embassy in Vienna in March of 1938. It was a time when Jews were trying to get out of Vienna, but the U.S. was not aware of mass killing or concentration camps yet and visa quotas were pretty limited. Given the rules of the time, each group was given a sample visa application and had to decide whether or not to grant the visa. The exercise was basically to get us to think about how we can work within the system even when it may not align directly with our moral beliefs. It was also to show that hindsight is 20/20 in many of the situations we will face.

Today was our last day of regular classes for the week. I enjoyed the day because we did more cable writing (I got pretty good feedback on my first assignment) and after lunch we did some discussion about the Myers-Briggs type indicator assessment. This was partly in preparation for our off-site team building sessions over the next two days. Tomorrow morning we leave early in the morning for a retreat center where we'll be doing team building and leadership exercises outside both days. I'm not sure what to expect, but I do imagine it will be a welcome change of pace from the classroom. Our CDOs will be on the trip too, working together on our assignments, though we still won't find them out until June 6th!