The Roma are a unique minority group in Europe, found in every European country and yet with no historical homeland. Unemployment rates for Roma settlements run as high as 100 percent. Poverty is prevalent. Education is often at the primary level or less.

As an intern at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg last fall, Paola Castellani was co-manager of a project on the education of Roma children. It was the perfect assignment. A native of Italy and master's student in international relations, Castellani sought practical experience in the areas of migration and conflict studies.

"At Maxwell, I studied intercultural communication and conflict and this is what I got to do every day," she says. "I was finally putting into practice what I'd been learning in school."

Castellani worked on several intercultural-education projects, but the focus was Roma children. She developed workshops, made presentations, met with experts, and attended Parliamentary assembly meetings and the First Plenary Session of the European Roma and Travellers Forum.

All I.R. students at Maxwell do internships, but Castellani was one of eight who spent the fall '05 semester in a European Union country as part of the Global Europe Program. That program is unique at Maxwell, in that it is funded by the European Commission through the Maxwell-based EU Center. The program is intended to allow young people from the United States to learn more about Europe and how the EU functions. It includes a week-long seminar, introducing students to issues of concern in the European Union; visits to the European Parliament, Council of Europe, and European Court of Human Rights; and a day-long seminar, back on campus, where returning students share their experiences with the University community. It's a model of what international internships should be, says Margaret Hermann, director of the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs: "We'd love to be able to offer this kind of paid experience in other parts of the world."

Students in the Global Europe Program are also required to do research. That research is often pertinent, as well, to the master's paper they're required to write for their I.R. degree. (Castellani, for example, is writing her master's paper on the education of Roma children.)

A joint M.P.A./ M.A. (I.R.) student, Michael Turner spent his Global Europe internship as a research assistant at the Luxembourg Income Study. He interviewed government and nongovernment officials about problems in immigration and integration, research he was able to use when he wrote his thesis paper on the integration of migrant populations into Luxembourg society.

"I was writing on immigration and integration and I felt like I experienced some of the things immigrants go through," he says. "I experienced the day-to-day problems of living in a culture when you don't speak the language and don't know the local customs. It's entirely different from learning about a country abstractly in the classroom."

Also interested in immigration issues, Mark Valadao interned at the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) in Brussels, where he conducted research on migration and development. "It was an amazing opportunity to be able to engage with European institutions on the major issues the European Union is facing, immigration being one of them," he says.

After completing his thesis -- on the development of asylum policy in Europe and inconsistencies between the policy and the movement toward migration and development -- Valadao returned to Brussels to work on additional projects for the JRS. A dual citizen of the U.S. and Portugal, he's hoping the extended assignment could lead to a salaried position.

"Our students are given very responsible positions and do very well in them," says Hermann. "Often, their recommendations lead them to their first jobs."
According to Hermann, the Washington delegation of the European Commission considers Maxwell's Global Europe internship program as among the best programs of its nature in the United States.

"There's no better way to learn about something than having hands-on experience working on real problems. Doing that while living in another culture only adds to the experience," says Castellani. "The internship confirmed that this is the direction I want to pursue professionally."
 

                                                                                     —Renée Gearhart Levy