“Keep asking questions” – Interview with Colin Jenkins, former UWCAC Principal

Gala von Nettelbladt, Germany and Rina Amanda Kuusipalo, Finland (AC 08-10); Daniel Prinz, Hungary (AC 07-09)

 

Colin Jenkins worked at Atlantic College from the early 1970s in different positions: Biology teacher, Senior Scientist, Houseparent, Member of Environmental Monitoring Unit Service, Director of Studies, CAS Coordinator and Principal. He has worked as Examinations Director and Deputy Director General of the IB, Acting Principal of the UWC in Singapore, helped establish the UWC in Costa Rica and is now working on the establishment of a new UWC in Maastricht.

“Spreading the United World Spirit through the air”

Atlantic College Radio – Spreading the United World College spirit through the air. A Radio Show which is founded, organised and produced unilaterally by Atlantic College students. It seeks to provide a platform to discuss the differences and similarities of a wide range of cultures represented by students from all over the world no matter what social or economic background. It is the hope that this show will become a mechanism through which the unique ideas and creative vision of the United World Colleges can be exchanged and circulated. Furthermore, it will give those not yet familiar with the United World College community some insight into its motivating forces in their most energetic and exciting form.

We were very proud to present our pilot show in April 2009, which we hope will inspire other United World Colleges to follow our path. In this very first show we interviewed Atlantic College students from Israel and Palestine. The objective was to emphasize the unique cultural and personal identities of the region and give an understanding of life outside of the scope of the highly publicized violent conflict in the area.

All shows will appear on in the internet www.unitedwords.org as a way of expressing the vision of Atlantic College through yet another medium.

The hosts of Atlantic College Radio
Severin Engelmann (Germany), Dylan Hitchcock-Lopez (Alaska)

Remember remember the 23rd of September

Leonardo Goi (Italy, AC07-09)

 

The man who walked onto the podium of Manchester’s Labour Party conference, on September 23^rd, amidst a rapturous applause, had a delicate mission to accomplish. He had to restore his position as the only legitimate leading candidate of the Labour Party. He had to re-polish his figure and reinstate prestige to the nation upon which he stood – the same nation which looked at him, moved, as he entered Downing Street in 2007, eager to restore the Blairite legacy. Gordon Brown’s voice was not trembling, as he delivered his lifetime speech, proclaiming his leadership and the present inopportunity of a “novice” at the head of the party, whilst chasing the shadows of plotters struggling to oust him. 

An American’s perspective on the American election

Kenneth Corn (United States, English teacher at AC)

As I was asked to write on my personal view concerning the forthcoming Presidential election in the USA by the editors of ‘United Words’, I thought that I’d start with a couple of clarifications.  First of all, though I was born in Chicago, grew up in NY, and lived for some years in California, I have now lived for about half my life in Great Britain.  I am both a citizen of the USA and as of about 2 years ago, a citizen of the UK.  I vote in both countries’ elections.  The second thing, as I am sure anyone who has seen the ‘Obama’ stickers on my bag will realise, I am not without my own bias.  In fact, I’m proud of my politics, and I believe that everyone has biases and political viewpoints (whether they are aware of this or not).  That said, here are some of my thoughts on 2008 election process that is underway, and which culminates on November 4th 2008:

Jamaica not only good at reggae and tourism

Wrenford Thaffe (Jamaica, AC07-09)

This summer, Jamaica made history at the games of the 29^th Olympiad in Beijing, China. The tropical island, nestled in the Caribbean region, proved to the world that reggae and tourism are not the only sectors we excel in. The country took the games by storm, as it recorded an historic 11 medal win, totaling 6 golds, 3 silver and 2 bronze. In addition, thousands of fans in the Bird’s Nest Stadium witnessed Jamaica’s excellence on the tracks. Usain Bolt was the star of the games. The young man finished after claiming three world records and the title, “The Fastest Man on Earth.”

International Summer School brings together UWC students

Daniel Prinz (Hungary, AC 07-09)

The International Summer School on Climate Change and the Water Cycle was the first of what is planned to be a series of Summer Schools taking place at the United World College of the Adriatic (UWCAD). UWCAD is located in a village called Duino, near Trieste in Italy and is one of the foremost members of the United World College movement accepting only full scholarship students from about 80 countries around the world. The student population also includes music and physics scholars, that is the college dedicates a number of its scholarships to students with special talents in these fields. The physics scholarship programme is also run in cooperation with local research centres like The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP). The college also organized the summer school together with ICTP and the WATCH. The school was attended by students from 11 UWCs (UWCAC, UWCAD, RCNUWC, UWC Mostar, UWC Costa Rica, UWC-USA, Pearson, MUWCI, UWCSEA, LPCUWC and UWC Swaziland). Two Italian students outside of the UWC movement were also invited to attend the conference as well.

Tough Times for the EU

Daniel Prinz (Hungary, AC 07-09), Andrea Mihic (Switzerland, AC 07-09)

The European Union (EU), political, economic and recently somewhat military alliance of 27 European countries, is facing a couple of crucial changes. The organization, originally founded by six states (Belgium, Luxemburg, The Netherlands, France, Italy and the Federal Republic of Germany) intending to strengthen their positions in a US/USSR-dominated world economy, now has member states across the continent. Besides their unity in common values, they are certainly culturally diverse and therefore to some extent divided. Needless to say, Germany, with its 82 million citizens and its political controversies over immigration and social tensions due to high unemployment has different problems from welfare state Sweden with high tax rates and life quality. Luxemburg, a tiny country of bankers, being amongst the richest countries in the world (highest GDP per capita), is different from Hungary, a state of post-socialist transitional economy, coping with unsustainable welfare services, ineffective education system and macroeconomic disequilibrium.

Severity of Holocaust to overwrite human right to live?

Daniel Prinz (Hungary, AC 2007-2009)

2nd of April marks the anniversary of the beginning of the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem; 11th of May is the anniversary of his capture in Buenos Aires.

SS-Obersturmbannführer Karl Adolf Eichmann (1906-1962) was one of the most well-known Nazi leaders. Joining the Nazi Party in Austria in 1932, he made his way up to the leadership of the department dedicated to Jewish affairs in the Gestapo. He was one of the main propagators of the Endlösung, which was supposed to be the final solution for the “Jewish problem”. The initial plan was to get the European Jewish population out of the continent by organized emmigration. Eichmann himself was sent to Palestine before the war to negotiate with Arab leaders. Later on, the actual Endlösung of the Wannsee Conference put forward the system of deatch camps to exterminate Jews (and other groups which were regarded as subordinate by the Nazis, for example gypsies).

Empty Stomachs for Free Tibet

Daniel Prinz (Hungary, AC07-09) and Justin (US, AC07-09)

 

The members of Students for Free Tibet (SFT) in UWCAC recently organized a hunger strike campaign. We asked Justin (United States, AC07-09), one of the participants, a few questions about the campaign, the events in Tibet and about his views concerning the present and future issues.

 

Russian-NATO tensions over post-socialist countries in NATO

The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) is holding its 59th summit in Bucharest. The key topics are the presence in Afghanistan and the enlargement of the alliance which presently has 26 members.

Founded in 1949, from the early years of the Cold War NATO faced the Warsaw Pact of the communist countries led by the Soviet Union until the latter one collapsed in the late 1980s. Those four decades could be described as years of high tension, though constantly fluctuating. There were peaks like the Cuba missile crise and times when the two blocs were fairly happy living together.

UWC Maastrict to become the 13th member of the family

From the recent UWC National Commitee Newsletter:

“At the recent International Board Meeting in Mumbai, the United World
College Maastricht was granted Final Approval and is scheduled to open in the
autumn of 2009. Final Approval was given after detailed work between a Board Task
Force and the UWC Maastricht project team, and the submission of a
comprehensive set of documentation in support of the proposal to the International
Board.

The College will educate students from pre-school to upper secondary level,
including day and boarding students. Boarding students undertaking the IB
Diploma will be selected by UWC National Committees, and the project expects
there to be 200 Boarding students at this level from 60 countries by 2015.

English will be the language of instruction. In addition to the standard
subjects, all students will study Dutch as the host country language, as an
essential part of their integration into the community.

As the opening day of UWC Maastricht approaches, National Committees should
expect more information about the nature of programme, facilities, etc. in
preparation for the first intake of students next year.”

Members of the LPC UWC Faculty Consultative Committee write letter to the International Board of Directors

This letter was sent by Steve Reynolds, Anna Kelly and John Green, members of the LPC UWC Faculty Consultative Committee to Mr Tim Toyne Sewell, Chair of the International Board of Directors.

Yaroslav Zabavskiy (Russia, AC07-09) about President Putin, the media and Chechnya…

Daniel Prinz (Hungary, AC07-09) asks Yaroslav Zabavskiy (Russia, AC07-09), who lives in Tomilino, Luberci Region, Moscow District, questions about the current political situation in his home country.

In the present Russia or in your environment what do you see remaining from the Soviet era?

There are a lot of changes even compared to the 1990′s. During my childhood there were food shortages which is now not a problem any more. What remained are the people in the parliament and the government. They were all born during the communism. So people are still the same. Our ideology and strategy changed, we removed the monuments of Lenin and Stalin, we renamed the streets, people became able to travel to the western world. On the last elections the Communist Party of the Russian Federation gained 57 seats Duma [it is the second largest after the United Russia, the party of Putin with 315 seats - editor]. On the other hand I don’t see any chance for communism to come back.
Our politicians used to vote for communist leaders and then suddenly all of them became democrats. Sometimes the old generation of the politicians apply Soviet ways of thinking for different goals.

Is Putin a part of this so-called old generation?

No, definitely not. He brought new ways of thinking and democratic means of government.

But from the western media it seems the Putin sometimes uses not so democratic instruments…

Well, Putin’s status as a national leader is very high which I don’t think is right. This reminds many people to the Soviet times. Not the way he rules, but his popularity amongst ordinary people. Sometimes his like a tsar. Sometimes there are ideas that he should become a sort of Russian Lukashenko [Alexander Lukashenko, president of Belarus since 1994 – editor] and rule for his life. In 2007 there were wide concerns about this, but now it seems that he is ready to leave power at the end of his second term.

But is not he keeping his power becoming a prime minister? According to the constitution the power is with the president but probably he will be able to influence the new president, especially because it seems it will be his choice.

Medvedev [the potential candidate for the presidency, nominated by Putin – ed.] is a quite powerful personality of Putin’s party, since 2004 he has had a high appointment as First Deputy Prime Minister and First Deputy Chairman of Council for Implementation of the Priority National Projects which apparently he fulfilled well, so that is why he is popular not because of Putin.

Is there anybody else who can potentially become a president as well?

There are some like people Zhirinovsky [Vladimir Volfovich Zhirinovsky who ran for presidency in 1991, 1996 and 2000, his best result being 7.81% - ed.]. But they do not really have any influence. It is not good, that we only have one real candidate, the people do not have much choice. But this candidate is good and reliable.

What is the role of the media? Is it free and working?

It is, you can find many anti-Putin media on the internet or in bookshops. It is not like in Soviet times, when you could not say anything against the leaders. People make the choice, but they only have one choice. This is a bit unfair, that Putin’s party is this influential in the Parliament.

At the end of the day is this democracy?

A kind of democracy. Year by year Russia is becoming more and more democratic. The western media is quite manipulative. Russia is not a perfect democracy but it is getting better and better, people started to live better. This is a fact. Compared to the 1990′s, now people can buy food in shops. At that time they could not. Not because they were poor but there was not enough food in the shops. There is certainly a possibility of growing democracy. But we were all afraid of Putin becoming a national leader for ever, but now we know he will not break the constitution and stay for one more term.

What is the role of the secret services?

If they do influence our life in anyway it is good, as they are fighting terrorism and the drug problems.

What do you think of Chechnya?

The war there is kind of stopped now. There is no massive battles or bombing there. The situation is quiet. Not many terrorist attack for a long time which is very good. The president [Asajef – ed.] was killed, now his son leads the territory. There are big improvements carried out (schools, social institutions).

But then what do the terrorists want?

They want the independence of Chechnya. At the moment they are just hiding. Since Putin is the president some big names were killed (for example Basayev). I remember when I was small during the Yeltsin-era there were news about attacks every week. Now it is only small groups in mountains and they are much less strong than they used to be.

But isn’t their aim legitimate? Don’t they have a right to be independent?

Putin said “we do not negotiate with terrorists”. No, the people of Chechnya do not wish to be ruled by these leaders of the terrorists. They think the Russian army is good for them, they are not on the side of the terrorists, who destroyed everything in Grozny. Now it is fully repaired. They can just compare. They have their own president in their own republic. They are mostly muslims, they have their religion. There is no way to be ruled by people who kill children. These terrorists are not being seen as freedom-fighters. They are just terrorists.

What do you think about plans for the unification of Russia and Belarus?

I have heard about it, but the government officially did not say it is true. I have not heard anything from the Belorus government either. It is like a joke. There is no way for this plan. We had some problems over oil and gas, but our nations have good relations.

A last question: why do you have a red star at the top of one of the towers of the Kremlin?

In the eyes of the people it has no connection with the red terror. People are just used to it. You do not see any monument of Stalin any more. There are still some of Lenin. The problem cannot be in any stars, it is in the heads of the people. For me from the new generation a red star looks nice on the top of a red building on the Red Square. And that’s it.

- United World College Student Magazine -