Biographies - United States
| Ambassador Robert R. Gosende | Ms. Sally Crimmins Villela | Ms. Claudia Hernandez | Ms. Linda Veraska |
| Dr. John Ryder | Ms. Lori Thompson | Ms. Sally Lampson | |
Ambassador Robert R. Gosende, Associate Vice Chancellor for International Programs
Ambassador Gosende came to the State University in 1998 after 35 years as a Foreign Service Officer. He joined SUNY as Special Assistant to the Chancellor for International Programs. In July of 2001 Mr. Gosende was appointed Associate Vice Chancellor for International Programs. Ambassador Gosende's career in the Foreign Service of the United States in the U.S. Information Agency and the Department of State was extensive and varied. His overseas experience included tours of duty as a Cultural Affairs Officer in Libya, Somalia, and Poland and as Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs in South Africa and in Russia. Mr. Gosende was President Clinton's Special Envoy to Somalia during the height of the security and humanitarian crisis in that country in 1992-93. On tours of duty in Washington, D.C., he served as the Associate Director of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the U.S. Information Agency and as that agency's Deputy Director and Director for Sub-Saharan African Affairs. During 1994 he was Senior Advisor to the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, directing the US Government's public affairs activities in support of the first multi-racial elections held in South Africa in April of that year.
During the 1978-79 academic year, Mr. Gosende was a Fellow at the Center for International Affairs and the Ukrainian Research Institute at Harvard University. For the fall semester of the 1992-93 academic year, he served as a Diplomat in Residence at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, teaching an undergraduate/graduate course in Public Diplomacy and conducting seminars on Southern African and Eastern European Affairs. Mr. Gosende served as the Edward R. Murrow Professor of Public Diplomacy at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University for the 1994-95 academic year. While at Fletcher he taught a course on Public Diplomacy and initiated two research projects with Fletcher and the Woodrow Wilson School of International Studies at Princeton University which explored the lessons learned from the U.S. intervention in Somalia and the role of ethnicity and self-determination in national and international affairs in the post-Cold War era.
A native of Springfield, Massachusetts, Ambassador Gosende received his B.A. and M.A. degrees from American International College in that city. American International College awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1991 in recognition of his work promoting international educational and cultural exchange. He was the 1989 recipient of the Annual Distinguished Service Award from the American Institute of Polish Culture and Art for his contributions to the expansion of educational and cultural relations between the US and Poland. Mr. Gosende received Presidential Awards from Presidents Bush and Clinton for his service as USIA's Director for African Affairs and as the President's Special Envoy to Somalia.
Dr. John Ryder, Director, Office of International Programs
John Ryder has been with the State University of New York for more than 30 years, first as an undergraduate, then as a graduate student, later as a professor of philosophy and dean, and currently as Director of International Programs at the State University of New York (SUNY) System Administration, a position he has filled since January 2002.
John Ryder earned his B.A. from the State University of New York, College at Cortland and his M.A. and Ph.D. in Philosophy from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He is a specialist in the History of American Philosophy. Prior to moving to SUNY's System Administration he served for six years as Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at SUNY Cortland, where he was also Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy. During his tenure there, Dr. Ryder's energy and imagination went far in internationalizing the Cortland campus. He conceived and created academic partnerships that remain strong and active to this day, and he was instrumental in the development of SUNY Cortland's Center for International Education.
In 2002 Dr. Ryder was elected President of the Alliance of Universities for Democracy (AUDEM), an organization of universities from the U.S. and Central and Eastern Europe that promotes collaborative academic activities and relationships. He continues to serve in that capacity to this day, and his efforts have resulted in the development of a number of institutional connections with universities and scholars in the region.
He also serves as Director of the State University's Center on Russia and the United States. In that role, Dr. Ryder coordinates joint activities of the State University of New York and Moscow State University, including dual degree programs in various fields at undergraduate and graduate levels and coordinating visiting scholars programs at both sites.
Dr. Ryder is the author of Interpreting America: Russian and Soviet Studies in the History of American Thought (1999), the editor of American Philosophic Naturalism in the Twentieth Century (1994), and a co-editor of The Philosophical Writings of Cadwallader Colden (2002), The Blackwell Guide to American Philosophy (2004), Pragmatism and Values (2004), and Reconstruction and Deconstruction (2004). The latter two books are proceedings of the Central European Pragmatist Forum, of which Dr. Ryder is co-founder and co-director. He is also the author of numerous articles that have been published in the U.S. and abroad, and his work has been translated and published in several languages. His current academic work focuses on the application of principles of American philosophic traditions to an understanding of international relations.
Ms. Sally Crimmins Villela, Senior Associate Director, Office of International Programs, and Director for Latin American Programs
Prior to joining the Office of International Programs staff in 2004, Sally Crimmins Villela had extensive experience working on sponsored international projects through SUNY's Center for International Development. Ms. Crimmins Villela attended the University at Albany where she received her B.A. in Spanish Linguistics and pursued M.S. studies in TESOL and advanced graduate studies in Language Acquisition and Education. She has worked and studied in Mexico, Brazil, Spain and Portugal. She is a fluent speaker of both Spanish and Portuguese, and speaks and understands some French and Italian. During her years in Brazil, she was an adjunct faculty member at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Natal, Brazil, where she taught English and TOEFL preparation for faculty and other members of the university community. She later developed and delivered a short-term intensive English immersion program for management training at one of the big ten multinational accounting firms in Sao Paulo.
Upon return to the United States, Ms. Crimmins Villela taught Portuguese as a full-time lecturer at the University at Albany, where she also oversaw beginning Spanish language instruction. For the following several years, Ms. Crimmins Villela worked on development projects in Brazil, Hungary, and Mexico at SUNY's Center for International Development. The Brazil project, which began as a scholarship initiative funded by the Brazilian Government, grew into a specialized environmental training project which received support from USAID and had a special emphasis on sustainable development. Ms. Crimmins Villela spearheaded the creation of an independent non-governmental organization in Brazil which took on an increasingly important role in the planning and delivery of that training. She worked on the development of the legal entity, organizational planning, the establishment of procedures, accounting, fundraising and training of personnel for the organization which has since become independent of RF/SUNY, and has expanded and received funds from several international donor agencies while continuing to provide high quality training options in the environmental sector. Ms. Crimmins Villela has also taught Portuguese as an adjunct faculty member at Union College in Schenectady, New York. Over the years, she has worked, on a consultant basis, interpreting and translating Portuguese and Spanish in a variety of settings.
As Deputy Chief-of-Party of CID's Mexican Congressional Support Project (supported by USAID), Ms. Crimmins Villela spent time living and working in Mexico. During her time there, she worked extensively on the creation of an online course in legislative theory and practice in conjunction with Universidad Iberoamericana. She worked with the 32 state legislatures in the country, as well as the federal Chamber of Deputies and Senate, to enroll over 100 staff and members. She also worked on SUNY/CID's groundbreaking comprehensive survey of state legislatures in Mexico, published in 2004, State Legislative Power in Mexico.
Ms. Lori Thompson, Associate Director International Partnerships
Lori Thompson came to the Office of International Programs in 2000 and established the State University office in Ankara, Turkey in December 2004. In addition to her current work with Turkish institutions of higher education, she has experience in grant proposal preparation, activities management, web site development and library services. Ms. Thompson holds a B.A. in English writing.