Environmental Studies Professor Jack Shepherd will leave the College this fall to become the first director of the Global Studies Initiative at Cambridge University in England.
A new part of the university's Global Security Program, the initiative will put Shepherd in charge of 24 senior fellows investigating conflicts in Eastern and Central Europe and Southern Africa.
The fellows will focus on four areas in their home nations: the environment, conflict resolution, the economy and the migration of peoples.
In his new position, Shepherd will spend one-third of his time teaching as a member of the Social and Political Sciences faculty in Emmanuel College, one of 31 colleges within Cambridge. He will spend the rest of his time directing the new Global Security Initiative.
"It's a combination of the two things I've been working on at Dartmouth: conflict resolution and the environment," Shepherd said.
Shepherd was invited by Cambridge to apply and competed against 267 candidates for the job. He was one of four finalists flown to Cambridge for an interview in the spring.
Shepherd came to the College in 1988 as the Director of War/Peace Studies, a program begun in 1983 by Sociology Professor Emeritus Elise Boulding.
The program presently involves two courses: Introduction to War/Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution in International Politics, but will change with curriculum changes for the Class of 1998, according to Shepherd.
"What would be ideal is to make War/Peace Studies a minor in a multi-disciplinary curriculum. Unfortunately my leaving comes at a bad time because it will have to wait a year," Shepherd said of the upcoming academic year during which the fate of the program will be decided.
As a member of the Environmental Studies Department, Shepherd taught a freshman seminar on food aid, environmental journalism and environmental mediation.
Shepherd also led the Environmental Studies Foreign Study Program in Kenya in 1991. This summer Shepherd has been working on a new pre-Kenya curriculum to be in effect for students participating in the program Winter term 1995.
As a magazine journalist for 16 years, Shepherd covered events in Sub-Saharan Africa and became interested in scarce resources as triggers to conflict and how they can be used to settle conflicts.
"He's one of the best professors I've had at Dartmouth," Joe Santos '95 said. "He expects a lot from the students, but if you put in the work, you'll get a good grade."
As part of the conflict resolution class, students are required to receive 24 hours of mediation training.
Several students in the Class of 1993 used their training to create the Dartmouth College Mediation Center, which resolves disputes between any two parties that bring their argument before the center.
Shepherd has been the head of the center since its start in the Summer of 1991.
Between 30 and 40 students are presently trained as mediators and about 16 are involved in the Center, according to Shepherd.
Rabbi Daniel Siegel will head the Mediation Center after Shepherd's departure. Siegel has been a member of the Center's Steering Committee since 1991 and received mediation training in Vancouver, Canada.
Beginning in September, Shepherd will travel to Czechoslovakia, Poland and other Eastern European countries to speak with possible Global Security Initiative fellows and nominators of fellows, and to research environmental issues in the area.
The fellows, between the ages of 35 and 45, are people of a "certain caliber," whether in the form of a formal degree or practice in the political arena, said Dee Noyes, Global Security Program Administrator at Cambridge.
Each fellow will spend three months at Cambridge, six months in the home country and then another three months at the university. During that time, the fellows will develop an "action plan" for resolution of problems in the home nation.
"We're all very excited about [Shepherd] coming," Noyes said. "He strikes us as a very dynamic person who has shown commitment to the ideas behind this sort of work."
While forging new ties with Cambridge, Shepherd said he does not want to lose touch with Dartmouth. He is retaining his appointment as a Dickey Endowment Fellow and as adjunct professor in the Environmental Studies Department.
"I have taught at seven different universities and colleges and have found Dartmouth students to be the best," Shepherd said. "It has made me love teaching."
Shepherd hopes to keep a bridge between the two schools with a leave term internship offered through the Dickey Endowment. The internship, still in the works, would allow Dartmouth students to take classes at Cambridge and do field work with the fellows.
"He was interested in more than just what you do in the classroom, which makes him stand out from other teachers," Ben Murphy '95 said. "He's one of the few teachers who came to see me play Rugby."
