International Visitor Leadership Program Delegations

By Ellie Panahi, IVLP Intern

As the International Visitor Leadership Program Intern, I am very fortunate to be able to assist in coordinating various IVLP delegations that come to Indianapolis, which includes interacting with distinguished individuals of diverse cultural and professional backgrounds. These participants are selected by American embassies overseas, after which the chosen individuals travel to the United States, usually for a period of a couple weeks, in order to meet with professional counterparts and gain a deeper understanding of how the particular theme (for that specific delegation) is carried out in an American context.

For example, this past week (from June 18^th to June 20^th) The International Center welcomed two delegations: the first included participants from Croatia relating to anti-corruption, and the other was a multi-regional project relating to American libraries. The participants of the latter were from diverse countries all over the world: Chile, Ethiopia, India, Lebanon, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Portugal. During their two-day stay in Indianapolis, I accompanied the American Libraries delegation in their meetings; for example, we traveled to Indiana University in Bloomington to the School of Library and Information Science. We also visited the Sheridan County Library and the downtown branch of the Marion County Library. A wide range of library-related visits were scheduled for these participants so that they could have a holistic view of library systems and trends in Indiana and the United States in general.

It was such a great experience to finally meet the visitors for which the IVL Program had been preparing for several weeks, and to see the staff’s hard work pay off. It is especially rewarding to know that we, at The International Center, have contributed to these participants’ professional careers by coordinating their stays in Indianapolis, and that their respective countries will be positively affected by new implementations brought about by participants of the programs.

As these two delegations have come and gone, the IVLP team (Beth, myself, and other staff as needed) are preparing for three, maybe four, more delegations in late July and early August. The delegations that have been finalized are an African regional program on transparency and good governance, a U.S.-European Security Issues program with two participants from France, and a multi-regional program on public health. Still pending is a Vietnamese delegation that would be learning about online journalism. I am very excited to prepare for the arrival of these delegations and their participants, and to be able to contribute to their continued success.