26 July 2007
Former Exchange Students, Now Adults, Report Successes
Young professionals start businesses, aid communities, influence campaigns
Washington -- Chisinau, Moldova’s capital, has a new mayor, elected June 17. He is Dorin Chirtoaca, remarkable because he is an under-30 bachelor who overcame low name-recognition to win.
Chirtoaca may have learned lessons from an earlier campaign, which he lost. But Alexandr Snaidruc, a computer student at Moldova State University and high-tech worker, says Chirtoaca won, at least in part, because he energized an army of young volunteers, many of them -- like Snaidruc -- alumni of cultural exchange programs with the United States.
Snaidruc, visiting Washington July 26, said he himself had campaigned for Chirtoaca, a liberal who ran against the candidate of the governing Communist Party. “Everybody was trying to help [Chirtoaca], giving whatever we had,” Snaidruc said of a group of exchange program alumni who joined the campaign. The young campaign workers were paid with pizza.
Each year, some 30,000 people, many students, travel to the United States to participate in exchange programs hosted by the U.S. State Department. On their departure, they typically report that they enjoyed learning about America, making new friends and sharing their own cultures with their hosts.
But clearly, their experiences do not end there; many of them maintain formal networks into adult life. Chisinau’s new mayor, for instance, is an alumnus of an exchange program to the United States and has headed an exchange alumni group in Chisinau for two years. The group’s members, including Snaidruc and other professionals and students, trust him. “He got our votes, and he got our help with the campaign. I think it will have a positive impact on our country,” Snaidruc said.
Snaidruc was one of a dozen graduate students and business owners from former Soviet Union countries who, having spent a year as teens studying at American high schools, came back to spend the summer of 2007 in a professional development program sponsored by the State Department and private-sector partners Lehigh University and the Iacocca Institute.
The program they participated in years ago, the Future Leaders Exchange (FLEX) program, brings teenagers from former Soviet Union countries to attend U.S. schools for one year while living with host families. Hanna Zubko, of Ukraine, said most of the management positions at her high-tech company are filled by former FLEX participants.
The program Zubko, Snaidruc and the others just completed, called Global Village for Future Leaders, brings men and women in their mid-20s from every region of the world to spend six weeks honing business and community development skills.
The group told State Department officials, after completing the Global Village program, that it offered them invaluable advice from American business executives and academics.
Zubko said she improved her understanding of how to commercialize an invention and protect intellectual property rights. She also learned how companies can serve their communities through sponsorship of charitable events.
Ravshan Safarov, of Uzbekistan, who works at his family’s manufacturing business while studying economics, said he was able to study topics that might help him someday take the family business global. The participants completed real-world business projects with 84 others, who hailed from all over the world; they said the contacts they made among their peers will boost their careers.
“Wherever you go now, as a business or a person, you always have support,” Zubko said.
“I think we can make a difference by using all the experience we got here,” said Snaidruc. “OK, you make money, you make a business, but what else? Look around. You’ll see many things that need to be done.”
All of the visitors said they maintain contact with their host families from the FLEX program, and most planned visits to their “second moms and dads” before returning home.
“It is very important for all of us to stay in touch,” said Alina Romanowski, a State Department official who oversees exchange programs, “especially today when there are so many global issues.”
See also “A Life-Changing Experience” in an eJournal USA to read about one exchange student’s experience in the United States and get more information about the FLEX program.
Rena Hajiyeva of Azerbaijan talks about the FLEX community | 