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Fletcher Students Crisscrossing the Globe The Hall of Flags is again brimming with conversation. New students are trying to decide which courses to take and returning students are sharing stories about their exciting summers. Fletcher MALD students traditionally spend the summer between their first and second years doing internships. Adam Day (F’04) and Cornelia Jesse (F’04) sent our foreign affairs correspondent dispatches from Vietnam and Nicaragua on their summer projects. Adam Day: Hanoi, Vietnam Adam spent the summer in Vietnam as a Luce Fellow. Hosted by the Asia Foundation and sponsored by the Vietnamese government’s Institute of Economics, he worked directly with the United Nations Development Program in Hanoi. Adam completed a research project on the legal profession in Vietnam and its role in business development. By interviewing Vietnamese lawyers, judges and business owners, he was able to study how lawyers practice law, the role of the courts in dispute resolution and the difficult process of establishing an independent rule of law.  “My interviews were with a wide cross section of people. Some days I was on the top floors of office towers, talking with millionaire foreign lawyers and investors and other days I was in a small room, buried in the produce market of an outer district, talking to a business owner or small-time lawyer,” wrote Adam. Writing about researching in Vietnam, Adam said, “There has been very little red tape; I've even interviewed some top judges and gotten frank answers from them about problems in Vietnam. One friend said that "In Vietnam, nothing is impossible, but anything can happen." It is very true. It takes a lot of patience in the system to make any money here. There is a long distance between the written law and the law as it is practiced; and because so many political decisions are made by consensus, behind closed doors and among politicians of uncertain progressive/conservative leanings, it is difficult for outsiders, even if they wanted to buy access, to influence the process.” Besides attempting to answer questions such as, “How do lawyers in Vietnam help businesspeople to prosper in the new legal environment? Which companies use legal services? and Do lawyers practice law or simply "fix" bureaucratic problems?,” Adam had plenty of time to travel around Vietnam and get to know the culture. “I met up with lots of locals and got a sense of how the Vietnamese recreate--it involves lots of tea, alcohol and cigarettes!” Cornelia Jesse: Managua, Nicaragua Cornelia worked at the Inter-American Development Bank in Managua this summer, doing research on education reform in Nicaragua. She interviewed officials in the Ministry of Education, International Organizations and non-governmental organizations in addition to visiting different schools in poor and wealthy neighborhoods and rural and urban communities to get a better picture of the real situation. “This is the part I enjoy the most: talking to kids, directors, teachers and parents, seeing how dedicated and involved they are in the improvement of the schools, in spite of social and economic constraints. For example, in some remote rural communities, teachers have to swim across a river to get to their school. And more often than not, parents have to help with the construction of school buildings.”  Besides conducting research, Cornelia found Nicaragua an enjoyable place to live. “Nicaragua is of striking natural beauty, in terms of peoples, cultures landscapes. It has much to offer, from white Caribbean beaches to fuming volcanoes and tropical rainforests. However, it is the poorest country in Latin America and has suffered through many natural and man-made disasters such as Hurricane Mitch, earthquakes, volcano outbreaks, dictatorship and revolution. Despite or because of these, its people are resilient survivors and are characterized by an incredible spirit. Nicaraguans are very helpful, hospitable, open and curious about other people. Some of the best conversations I have had were with cab drivers in Managua, who shared stories about its history and culture with me.” Cornelia plans to use what she learned this summer to help her pursue her career goals. “Apart from significantly improving my Spanish and Salsa skills, my internship helped me to further develop my professional focus. When I get back to Fletcher, I will therefore create my own concentration in International Education & Development.” “My internship experience allowed me to learn in more detail about the intertwined and multi-facetted problems, difficult choices and trade-offs a developing country faces. It enabled me to get an insight into the business of development and the operations of a development bank. It also helped me to better understand the fine difference between policy-making in the capital and its implementation in the field.” |
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2002 The Fletcher School, Tufts
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