Kan Yan, MALD 2010, United States
On the classroom experience: Dyan Mazurana and Elizabeth Stites teach Gender, Conflict, and Culture in Humanitarian Complex Emergencies. Filled with fascinating ideas, conceived of with great wisdom, presented with experienced insight and pedagogical sharpness, the class is exactly what one hopes for in any educational venture. Dyan and Liz bring the material to life—they are teachers in the truest sense of the word. They understand their roles as inspirers rather than elaborators of PowerPoint slides. I have had very few educational experiences anywhere that have provoked in me the level of interest and desire to learn more than this course. I highly recommend it to everyone.
How my experience at Fletcher has changed the way I look at the world: I often feel like this place saved me. The structural character of the place and the people who fill it inspired the best in me at a time in my life when I was becoming myopically focused on professional pursuits—pursuits that in hindsight have little to do with pursuing a good life through meaningful struggles. The goodness and wisdom of the people I have met here inspire me to look at the world not only with a more critical analytic lens and a more practical means for utilizing that knowledge, but also with a greater humility, a greater compassion. To have one without the other is to see with only one eye. In this sense, Fletcher’s greatest gift to our worldview is its ability to illuminate the depth of understanding necessary for the immense challenges we face as people in this uncertain time.
Fields of Study
Human Security;
Humanitarian Studies
Education before Fletcher
JD, Harvard Law School (concurrent joint degree in progress);
BA, University of Texas at Austin
Professional Experience before Fletcher
Interning with a Karen NGO in Thailand;Doing indigenous land rights work in Burma;
Teaching English and learning Chinese in China;
Riding a motorcycle from Guatemala to Texas;
Performing several Shakespeare plays in a rural Texas barn theater
Languages spoken
English;
Spanish;
Mandarin;
Chinese
Summer Internship
The Advocacy Project/Backwards Society Education (BASE), Nepalganj, Nepal