Every year we are privileged to send one student to participate in the Student Conference on United States Affairs at the United States Military Academy. (https://www.westpoint.edu/academics/academic-departments/social-sciences/conferences/student-conference-on-us-affairs) We are also privileged to fund these students trips through the generosity of the Hume Center at Virginia Tech. Each year a student participates in this experience it is consistently regarded at as a “life changing” experience. We are very grateful to the Department of Social Sciences (SOSH) at West Point for their continued inclusion of Virginia Tech Students. – Dr. Aaron Brantly, Director, Tech4Humanity Lab
By. CDT. Daniel Garland
This past November, I was privileged to represent Virginia Tech at West Point’s Annual Student Conference on U.S. Affairs (SCUSA). The conference started in 1949 and has consistently invited students from across the United States and the globe to have meaningful, guided discussions on how to address chosen topics in American foreign policy. This year, in 2022, was the first return to the conference’s normalcy since the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. Each iteration of this event comes with a working theme to center discussions around. Our overarching theme this year was: “American Foreign Policy in an Era of Polarized Politics and Revisionist Powers ”. In attendance were over 200 students representing over 100 institutions pursuing roles in the military, political, and private sectors. I spent four days on West Point’s campus and had an incredible learning experience in regard to forming practical policy and networking with professionals across various fields of study.
Volunteering cadets impressively coordinated the organization of the event. West Point allows for the student cadets there to start their own initiatives and run them with a faculty advisor much like Virginia Tech. Upon arriving at the LaGuardia Airport, the cadets had a shuttle for everyone landing there. We promptly made our way to the campus. Then, we were shown to our rooms. Chosen cadets offered to act as hosts for each of the delegates, where they would show us around the school, explain their traditions, and ensure we understood the schedule and map. My host was a senior on the Sandhurst Military Skills Competition joining Army’s Infantry upon graduation. JP was an incredible representative of West Point and happily showed me around during his busy schedule. We had plenty of moments to share the similar and contrasting military experiences of our respective schools.
After meeting our hosts, we had an introductory dinner with our topic groups. Each delegate and cadet participating was assigned to a foreign policy topic discussion based on expertise and interest. 12 students, including 3 West Point cadets and myself, were assigned to the Global Public Health Response topic. The main crux of our discussion was how to address preventing a future pandemic on a global scale based on policy that the United States could propose. The highlight of the conference was undoubtedly the roundtable discussions our group held to come to contextualize our issue, determine what is relevant, and suggest tangible, grounded policy recommendations. Our group of 12 was accompanied by two experts in the sphere of public health. Lieutenant Commander Rebecca Pavlicek is the Director of Bacteriology in the Wound Infections Department for the United States Navy and provided us insights from her experiences with various global health operations. We were also guided by Dr. Elizabeth Radin, who leads the health policy portfolio at the International Rescue Committee which is a humanitarian organization aimed at helping those affected by crisis and conflict. They provided incredible wisdom and nuanced perspective from their respective fields and greatly enhanced our conversations. Our discussion primarily balanced between the need to prepare for the next pandemic and the application of sensible, acceptable national foreign policy.
Our first discussion was roughly 4 hours long. After brief introductions, we immediately delved into the topic. With the question of enacting policy for worldwide medical and political cooperation being so broad, we spent a lot of time determining what the problems we were trying to address were and what could be legitimate, actionable U.S. policy. Our strongest focal points ranged from the role of government in public health, publicized versus privatized vaccine technology creation, to what extent the U.S. should cooperate with other countries in regard to global health crises, to the necessity of revitalizing medical infrastructure. We determined first that as the progenitor of these policies, America would need to be willing to have the most upfront stake in aid and initiatives.
Ultimately, by the third day, we had formed the nucleus of our policy to better handle and prepare for a future pandemic around three main objectives: communication, human resources, and technology. We concluded that these are the most tenable approaches we were able to take on a realistic scale when it comes to policy originated by the U.S. on a national scale. Firstly, we realized the problem with global communication in healthcare policy. One of our proposed solutions to this was to host biennial exercises and simulations at a conference on various global health topics facilitated by the U.S. This was intended to recognize international policy shortcomings, expand multinational problem-solving capabilities in healthcare, and discover solutions to future public health challenges. Addressing medical staffing shortcomings, we proposed that nations should utilize international organizations to develop a worldwide Registry of Health Care professionals, consistent in standards that coincide with the greater health interests of other countries, to sign onto the registry. Lastly, in regard to technological development, we drafted several policies to form global consistency in awareness of pandemics. For instance, one idea was to invest in emerging technologies globally that include forecasting using artificial intelligence and early warning systems. Another we suggested was to encourage the use of open-source technologies that allow contribution to information spread or usage by any party. The policy memorandum directed to the U.S. Congress, which organized our policy suggestions, was the satisfying denouement of the many hours of discussions and panels we had.
Overall, SCUSA was an incredible experience that was impressively well-organized by the cadets and staff at West Point. The people I met through my discussion table, the cadet hosts, and the expert staff, are incredible contacts whom I may work with in the future in similar career fields. The events hosted such as hearing the US representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, and the Q&A with health policy experts were privileges for me to attend. Ultimately, the highlight of this conference was undoubtedly constructing viable foreign policy for the United States with a team of interdisciplinary peers. I gained a vast amount of professional understanding and the opportunity to develop my skills within the realm of policymaking and research.