Country: Greece

Joseph Bock has been involved in almost every type of humanitarian relief effort, from natural disasters to civil wars around the globe. He directed Catholic Relief Services’ programs in Pakistan, Jerusalem, and the West Bank and Gaza. As vice president of the American Refugee Committee he oversaw programs in Bosnia, Croatia, Guinea, Iraq, Kosovo, Liberia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Pakistan, Rwanda, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Thailand, Nepal, and Uganda.

Despite his vast experience managing disaster relief, he says he’s never seen a humanitarian crisis as raw and disturbing as the one he witnessed in Athens when he was a Fulbright Specialist in 2015.

Many of those arriving in the Greek port city fled the bloody civil war in Syria, oppression in Iran, and ongoing instability in Afghanistan. Eritrean, Ethiopian, and Somali refugees are also among the refugee population. They endured treacherous journeys in small, battered wooden or inflatable boats to reach Europe, often losing loved ones along the way.

“What these people had been through already and the predicament of the city was unbelievable,” says Bock, director of the International Conflict Management Program at Kennesaw State University in Georgia.

Bock traveled to Athens on a short-term Fulbright Specialist grant to support local municipal officials seeking advice on managing the influx of refugees and migrants.

“Fulbright is known for academics and this was a humanitarian response,” continues Bock, who has Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in social work, a Doctorate in international relations.

“I was very happy to be involved,” Bock added. “I think it’s a really good direction for Fulbright to go in.”

Founded in the aftermath of World War II, the Fulbright Program was established to foster mutual understanding between the U.S. and countries around the world. The Fulbright Specialist Program enables U.S. professionals and scholars to work on short-term projects overseas in conjunction with local host institutions.

Bock primarily worked on a strategic plan to help the city cope with the massive influx of refugees and migrants with the aim of reducing tensions and maintaining stability in Athens. The city faced a perfect storm: economic depression, an estimated 50% youth unemployment rate and 100,000 new arrivals, many without legal status. Bock’s plan addressed violence prevention and identified the benefits of language training, acculturation classes, student visas, and temporary work permits to help new arrivals.

While in Athens, he skyped with his American students in Georgia about the situation on the ground. Bock also involved them in conceptualizing specific projects, such as how crowdsourcing can be used for identifying people in distress at sea.

“This is the new normal,” Bock says. “We need to get used to the fact that as the world warms up and social media allows people to communicate instantaneously more people will be on the move. We need to learn to adapt.”

As he sees it, the Fulbright Specialist Program is “on the cutting edge,” enabling academics to become practitioners and use their expertise overseas in crisis situations. He says he hopes the program continues to serve as a bridge between the two worlds.

“It is something that will inform what I do with the rest of my life,” Bock says. “I wish I could have done more good while I was there.”

“I think it exposes you to things you wouldn’t otherwise get exposed to. The real world pathos,” Bock explains. “To see the people coming off the boats in Lesvos. The people of Greece so generous. There is no way I could have understood this from reading the New York Times.”

The Fulbright Specialist Program was established in 2001 by the U.S. Department of State and the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) to enable U.S. professionals and scholars to work on short-term projects overseas in conjunction with local host institutions.

For more information about the Fulbright Specialist Program or to apply, please go to: https://fulbrightspecialist.worldlearning.org/the-fulbright-specialist-program/

A lifetime connection to Greece was something Susan Schwartz couldn’t have predicted when she decided to spend a summer in the Mediterranean as part of The Experiment in International Living. “I picked Greece because in fourth grade we studied Greece for the entire year. I had a really good teacher,” she said.

The year was 1966, and at that time it took two weeks by ship to get there, which she says was part of the adventure for a young American student. She lived with a host family in Preveza, a small seaside city in northwest Greece, and traveled with other Experimenters around the country. But it wasn’t the days spent in Athens or the cultural heritage sites such as Olympia and Delphi that made such a deep and lasting impression on her. Instead, it was the warmth of Susan’s host family that has endured for nearly 50 years.

“As a teenager they were better than my real family. I didn’t want to go home,” recalled the Chicago native. “The parents treated me like their youngest daughter.”

Susan believes that what makes The Experiment special is the immersive nature of the program which centers on the homestay.

She’s not the only Experimenter in her family. Her daughter Emily went to Mexico when she was 16 and as a result of her experience went on to learn Spanish and Portuguese and majored in Latin American studies. She became a journalist and ran the Dow Jones news bureau in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Said Susan proudly, “It gave her her start. As a result of The Experiment she became a Latina for her whole life.”

At the request of the Vermont office, Susan hosted Helene de Koven, a French medical student from Colmar, while Emily was away. Now Susan, a retired book publisher, says she is trying to convince her teenage granddaughter to be an Experimenter as well.

This summer, a generous gift from the Schwartz family provided scholarships for several students from the Midwest to take part in The Experiment. She supported the program because she believes it encourages young adults to embrace a global world and creates lasting bonds between people.

Susan has been back to Greece many times over the years to visit her host family and stays in close touch with her Greek sister Elizabeth, who, she says with relief, finally got email. Susan’s Greek family even hosted a 75th-birthday celebration for her mother in Athens several years ago.

While she laments that there’s no Experiment program for adults, Susan jokes that she and her husband are looking forward to their upcoming “homestay” with her Greek family next month.