Reaching Out to a Global Audience

Strategic communications and outreach are key Regional Center priorities. The NESA Center established an Outreach Office to coordinate all communication with:

• Points of contact in U.S. embassies overseas and foreign embassies in Washington
• Participants prior to and during our programs
• Alumni after they leave our seminars
• U.S. government stakeholders, both in Washington and overseas
• The interagency strategic communications community
• Media, both domestically and in the region

The Center’s goal is to generate a dialogue that begins with the programs and continues after participants leave. We produce short, non-attributed executive summaries after seminars and trips. These reports, circulated on a limited basis to senior USG stakeholders, contain key/new facts or opinions gleaned from discussions with participants. The purpose of the summary is to help senior policymakers stay informed of views to which they would not otherwise be exposed. Our executive summaries routinely generate responses from the 3- and 4-star-level.

The NESA Center Director is leading the development of an active media outreach program, including travel to the Arabian Gulf to meet with media in the region.

In 2006, NESA was the first Regional Center to hold a special Executive Seminar on Strategic Communication for more than 30 participants responsible for internal communications within their own respective governments. During their three-week seminar, they visited relevant sites such as the Defense Information School and the Broadcasting Board of Governors. Strategic Communications is now integrated into our core programs.

Participants: Outreach Starts Here

The Center’s ability to continue to generate programs that bring NESA region participants together is a result of the commitment of our participating countries who send their best and brightest to NESA Center seminars and workshops. Participants are almost equally divided between military and civilians, and they come from across our Combatant Commands. Recognizing the vital interests of countries outside of the NESA region, we also invite several NATO members to participate in our programs.

The Center’s core programs are held in new and expanding facilities in Washington, DC. We provide simultaneous interpretation into Arabic, French, and Dari for each seminar, affording us the opportunity to bring participants who might not attend because of language limitations.

For programs that are longer than two weeks, we provide each participant with a laptop computer for their use for the duration of the seminar, as well as offer computer instruction during lunch breaks. The National Defense University (NDU) librarians give all participants detailed training on how to use the NDU library online resources, including MERLN (Military Education Research Library Network), which will continue to be available to participants when they return to their homes. Furthermore, we provide training on our alumni web site which includes materials from all our previous seminars.

In addition to seminars we arrange experiences and meetings outside of the classroom. CT specialists attend meetings with the Pentagon’s J-5 office dealing with the War on Terrorism; a deputy spokesman for a NATO country foreign ministry spoke with the Rapid Reaction Unit in Under Secretary of State Karen Hughes’ office and we arranged for a one-star participant to meet with a Congressman to whom he had been introduced while the Member toured the Middle East.

The seminars are filled with information and the exchange of ideas, but we also want to share our home, Washington, DC, with the new and returning members of our growing NESA family. Outside of the classroom, we enjoy special events such as a tour of Washington landmarks. NESA staff and faculty are invited to bring family and we encourage participants to bring friends or family in the DC area, as a faculty member adds color with some background and little-known facts. (Why is the top two-thirds of the Washington Monument a different color from the bottom third? Why is there a canal lock-keeper's house on Constitution Avenue at 17th Street?)

After 3 1/2 intense weeks of seminars, our participants prepare a potluck supper to sample of some of the best foods from the NESA region and the opportunity to sit back and talk with each other about family, travel, culture... a limitless range of topics...with new friends.

Our Continuing Education Exchange and Relations (CEER) office makes it easy to stay in touch with each other, electronically and in person, through our web sites, by telephone and email and by arranging further events in Washington and in the NESA region.