The Center for International Trade & Security’s (CITS) Richard B. Russell Security Leadership Program (SLP), which celebrates its 20^th anniversary this year, is a selective, year-long opportunity for undergraduate students interested in careers in national and international security. Since its inception, the SLP has trained hundreds of national security leaders, particularly on issues related to diplomacy, intelligence, WMD nonproliferation, human security, and strategic trade management.

“The SLP’s mentorship, professional networking opportunities, and focus on professional skills––including policy writing and analysis, oral briefing, and grant writing––set our students apart from typical international affairs/political science undergrads at other universities,” said Program Director and Senior Lecturer in the Department of International Affairs Maryann Gallagher. “The SLP is a pre-professional program, a mini-grad program, and baptism-by-fire for students’ first jobs, all in one.”

Students in the SLP (15 in each cohort) develop the skills necessary to understand, analyze, and create policy related to national security and the management of international conflict. Two courses form the foundation of the program, complemented with a professionalization series to prepare their application materials for internships, jobs, and post-graduation opportunities. SLP students participate in CITS events throughout the year, including alumni visits and lectures, with the jewel in the crown of the program being the CITS “Spring Break in D.C.” trip.

The SLP is open to students from all academic backgrounds, majors, and year levels. Applications for the fall-semester-starting cohort open in March, while applications for the spring-semester-starting cohort open in October.

According to Gallagher, “The SLP existed long before it was formally established as the Richard B. Russell Security Leadership Program.” In the late 1980s, CITS created an undergraduate program for students interested in careers in national security, initially focused on internship opportunities at the center. Then, in 2004, with a generous annual donation from the Russell Foundation, the program was named after the former senator from Georgia, and established as a two-course sequence.

For most of the first decade, the SLP was directed by SPIA alumnus Chris Tucker (AB ’05, MA ’07). Under Tucker’s leadership, the SLP developed a reputation for providing students with a unique opportunity to develop expertise in export controls and non-proliferation. Their focused coursework and assistance with CITS’s Strategic Trade Management Academy launched many students into careers with the Department of Energy and national labs. Tucker’s leadership was followed by Josh Darnell, and Gallagher assumed the spot in 2020. Program size and progression have varied over the years; as of the current [Spring 2024] cohort, the SLP now launches a new cohort each semester rather than each fall. As the program has grown, additional funding has come from UGA’s Parents Leadership Council and individual donors.

“This kind of training and skill-building, coinciding with the research opportunities and the D.C. trip, is truly an unsurpassed opportunity for undergrads,” said Gallagher. “We’re thrilled to be able to be able to bring the program back to every semester and offer this opportunity to twice as many UGA students.”

Sara Beth Marchert (AB ’17) agreed. “The SLP gives students at UGA a specialized education that, for me, is so rare in undergraduate education,” she said. “I received graduate-level attention when I was 21, which gave me a specialization than I was searching for.”

Program Overview

INTL 4415: Skills Practicum and National Security Council Simulation

In the first semester of the program, students take INTL 4415, a practicum course covering policy writing, policy analysis, oral briefing, grant writing, and open-source intelligence gathering. These skillsets are put to the test in a two-week simulation of the U.S. National Security Council (NSC). Students are assigned to various high-level executive roles, such as President, Chief of Staff, National Security Advisor, Secretary of State, and Secretary of Defense, where they work to advise the president on three known crises. Gallagher, outside of the room monitoring via a 360 webcam, provides the “Director of National Intelligence” updates on additional surprise crises throughout the simulation.

“They are forced to juggle the long-term goals of the administration with short-term crisis issues,” said Gallagher. “It is the best way to test the skills that they’ve been working on all semester. They’re doing policy writing within a 48-hour turnaround; they task each other with assignments; and the president’s constantly asking them questions that none of them immediately have the answers to! It requires them to form coalitions behind the scenes, give daily oral briefings, and most of all, rely on teamwork.”

In the 2023 simulation, the members of the NSC faced several “ripped-from-the-headlines” foreign policy issues, from the South China Sea to the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf. In addition to these “known” situations, “unknown” challenges were introduced, including a looming environmental disaster off the coast of Yemen.

“The crises were selected to challenge the members to consider the tensions between U.S. strategic interests and values, to weigh long-term and short-term goals, and to experience the pressure of ‘drinking from the fire hose’ as policy makers are expected to juggle numerous ongoing crises at once,” reflected Gallagher.

Simi Kolodka (AB ’23), who served as President, said, “everyone was challenged to push themselves to not only understand and have the capacity to explain to others complex and nuanced topics, but to be confident enough to come up with solutions and defend [them] whilst cooperating with others to make said solutions better.”

“The NSC simulation taught me problem-solving, briefing, and communication skills,” said Ashni Patel (AB ’24), Advisor on Asia. “With numerous problems being thrown at us day-to-day, I, along with my peers, had to think creatively and quickly about solving issues.”

Sam Nunn Scholarship

Since becoming director, Gallagher has introduced grant writing to the curriculum of INTL 4415 and has tied skills building to the important legacy of former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn, a giant in the field of nonproliferation issues.

“I have heard from graduate school admissions offices that UGA’s SLP students are ready for graduate school, and they are regularly recruited for jobs in the public and private sectors,” she explained. “But our alums reported that they were often in positions, pretty early in their careers, where they were expected to be able to assist with grant writing. Our offering, while not what you would get at the graduate level, will give them a taste for these pre-professional skills.”

“If they go work at a think tank or a non-governmental organization, they will likely need to apply for funding, and we want them to be aware of what that looks like before they step into those roles,” said Gallagher. Excitingly, the SLP students submit a full grant proposal for a program that CITS could run in the future to engage young Georgians in security issues. Each semester, the members of the winning team’s grant proposal are awarded the Senator Sam Nunn Scholarship. “In this way, students not only learn the lingo of grant writing, and developing the important skills of program development and budgeting, but they can win a scholarship for their efforts, and CITS benefits with many wonderful ideas for increasing community engagement in the future,” noted Gallagher.

The winners of the Spring 2024 Sam Nunn Scholarship were Kiana Bussa (AB ‘25), Scott Butterfield (AB ’25), Austin Fabritius (AB ’24), and Sean Manning (AB ’25). Their proposed project, “Developing the Future of America’s Energy Workforce,” focused on improving education about energy security issues. Last year’s winners, Alex Drahos (AB ‘25), Sahar Joshi (AB ’24), and Riley Mied (AB ’23), proposed “Fission Forward,” aimed to increase awareness of nuclear security and nonproliferation issues among highschoolers in Georgia.

INTL 4425R: Security-based Research

The second course in the sequence, INTL 4425R, pivots to research (about nine hours per week, or 135 hours over the course of the semester) on a security-based project of their choice. Students again are focused on building professional skills. In addition to conducting original empirical research, students write op-eds on their project for more general audiences and present their work symposia on campus. Gallagher supervises all 15 projects.

“The overwhelming majority of them will present their research project at the SPIA Undergraduate Research Colloquium, which takes place every spring,” said Gallagher. “This year’s colloquium will be April 19th, and all students in the cohort will be presenting their research there.”

Past research topics have included Dan Doss’s (AB ’22) “How Should Energy Security Influence Investments in Alternative Energy?,” Jeanelle Garcia’s (AB ’22) “Sexual Violence and the Welfare of Women in ICE Detention Facilities,” and Thompson Miles’s (AB ’24) “Inside the Minds of Governmental Whistleblowers.”

Several students have submitted their SLP research for publication. For instance, Olivia Bauer’s (AB ’22) project “Insurgencies or Gangs: An Analysis of Service Provision by Criminal Organizations” was published in Georgetown’s Democracy & Society. Andrew Zach (AB ’22) published his research, “Send Lawyers, Guns, and a Dispersal Notice: An Analysis of the Insurrection Act of 1807 and its Application to the January 6^th Capitol Riots,” in the Columbia Undergraduate Law Review.

The research not only provides students with important skills for their careers, but it also provides evidence of research skills and a writing sample for graduate and law school. In recent years, SLP students have pursued post-graduate education at Harvard, University of Virginia, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Middlebury Institute of International Studies (MIIS), Stanford, University of Denver, and of course, UGA.

Other SLP students go directly to work in the security field. In recent years, SLP students have taken positions in government with the Department of State, Department of Justice, FBI, and Defense Intelligence Agency. Others enter the NGO and think-tank space, at organizations such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and the Wisconsin Project on Nonproliferation, or consulting and government services agencies such as Noblis, Deloitte, and KPMG.

Spring Break Trip

SLP fellows have the opportunity to attend the annual “CITS in D.C. Spring Break” trip alongside students from the Master of International Policy (MIP) program.

The 2023 CITS Spring Break to Washington, D.C. included visits to the Department of State, Department of Commerce, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Brookings Institution, Center for New American Security (CNAS), and several government service providers. In 2024, thanks to a group of SLP alumni working in the White House, the SLP students wrangled access to the exclusive Eisenhower Executive Office Building for a briefing by members of the (real!) National Security Council.

“The CITS D.C. trip allowed me to peer into the sometimes-opaque world of national and international policymaking in a way I had never been able to before,” said Sean Manning. “Engaging site visits, D.C. experiences, and networking opportunities helped me envision my future career in a manner I had not been able to prior.”

The CITS D.C.-based alumni are truly exceptional in their support of the SLP. They not only facilitate most of the visits for students on the Spring Break trip, but they also regularly reach out with internship opportunities, as well as mentorship and professional advice.

“A common theme throughout all of the site visits was that there is no one path to a career in federal service,” said Kiana Bussa. “All of the alumni I spoke to had their own unique paths with their own twists and turns, but they have all turned out okay. This trip equipped me with the confidence I need to keep moving forward.”

Additional Training and Networking Opportunities

The Security Leadership Program also hosts a varied selection of trainings and networking events over the course the year. For example, this May, students in the SLP will be able to participate in a training program on non-proliferation and safeguards related to monitoring radioactive material. The two-day event will feature a contingent of program alumni from Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, who will train both undergraduate and graduate students.

“This training gives them a certain level of proficiency as well as deeper insight into the world of nuclear safeguards,” said Gallagher.

CITS hosts at least four Global Decisions lectures each year. This February, students in the SLP were invited to a meet-and-greet with Dr. Maleeka Glover, executive director of WCAPS (Women of Color Advancing Peace, Security, and Conflict Transformation). In March, they participated in a virtual visit with the U.S.’s Ambassador to Russia, and UGA alumna, Amb. Lynne Tracy.

A “Learning Community”

Gallagher, whose research interests focus on in U.S. foreign policy decision making, and the intersection of gender and security, came to UGA in 2014 from a small liberal arts college. She immediately looked for the kind of mentorship relationships that yield high-impact outcomes in teaching and learning.

“I’ve worked with SLP students since I arrived; many of them were in my U.S. Foreign Policy or War and Gender courses,” said Gallagher. “I was always impressed by the caliber of the students and their enthusiasm for discussing conflict and security issues.”

When offered the directorship, she saw the opportunity to both enjoy the impact of small-cohort mentorship and build a new kind of learning model in higher education.

“I love mentoring undergrad students,” she said. “But there’s a difference, I think, between the kind of mentorship you can do when just teaching courses, and a program like this, which I would categorize as a learning community. These students are in a very small cohort of 15. They take two consecutive courses together and grow very close to each other. The personal connections they build with each other are just as important as the professional skills.” Gallagher also highlights that engagement outside the classroom is an important part of the SLP. “We get together socially outside of the class, for CITS events and the D.C. trip, and every Friday after class, we go to The Globe [the classic bar and eatery in Downtown Athens].”

SLP students have much to say about Gallagher’s distinct learning model, characterized by equal ratios of rigor and warmth. Ashni Patel, a member of the 2021-2022 SLP cohort, has been named a 2024 Schwarzman Scholar; as such, she is headed to Tsinghua University in Beijing, China in the fall to begin a one-year master’s program in global affairs.

“The SLP opened my eyes to the range of international affairs and national security careers that were attainable for students like me,” said Patel. “Dr. Gallagher and my peers in the SLP provided so much support and encouragement that made me more confident in myself and my abilities. The preparation and practice that the SLP gave me in written policy analysis, fast-paced oral briefings, and open-source research have not only made me a better student but also equipped me with the necessary skills to succeed in my internships at the U.S. Department of State and Department of Justice.”

“I often tell them, I want you to fall in this room, so that when you get out there in the real world, it’s not the first time you’re being asked to do something,” said Gallagher. “If you fall, we’re going to hold you up.”

This level of intimacy and individual attention has produced alumni superfans. When SLP hosted an alumni dinner last spring in D.C., 80 alumni showed up, mainly representing graduates from the past 10 years.

“I think the allegiance that they feel to CITS, the SLP, and each other is really remarkable and something special,” said Gallagher. “When we talked to students about the experience, they’re grateful for learning about the career opportunities and excited about connecting with alumni, but it is also the relationships that they build with each other. I tell them on the very first day: ‘This is your network, the people sitting around the table with you,’ and by the end of the program, they get it. They rely on each other so much, and this carries through.”

“Before I was selected as an SLP scholar, I had no clue what I wanted to do after UGA,” said Marchert. “I think finding mentorship and fellowship in a scholarly setting can be rare––but I found it in SLP. I found my passion for counterproliferation and the best friends I’ve ever met. I’ve now traveled across the US to spend time with my cohort; they serve as my best friends and my mentors.”

Further, SLP students overrepresent UGA overall on various national and international recognitions. UGA’s 2024 Rhodes Scholar, Mariah Cady (AB ’24), and 2023 Rhodes Scholar, Natalie Navarette (AB’ 23), are both alumni of the program, as well 2023 Fulbright Fellows Zainub Ali (AB ’23), Lindsey Rhyne (AB ’23), and Christopher Rosselot (AB ’23) and 2023 Boren Fellows Mariah Cady and Simi Kolodka.

“[The SLP] and its network of alumni helped me secure an internship at the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Smuggling Detection and Deterrence,” said Navarrete. “It connected my passion for foreign language and nuclear nonproliferation and inspired me to continue my research in the post-Soviet space during my MPhil in Russian and East European Studies at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar.”

“Because I am in this program, I have access to dozens of alumni in top security positions in governments, think tanks, and businesses around the world,” said Alex Drahos, recently named a 2024 Truman Scholar. “This program has opened so many doors for me and allowed me to explore security and succeed in the field through professional development and its extensive networks.”

In recent years, SLP students have won fellowships and other awards as well, including the U.S. State Department’s Pickering Scholarship (Feben Teshome (AB ’24); Clemencia El Antouri, (AB ’24)), USAID’s Payne Fellowship (Alexis Nash (AB ’23)), and the Herbert Scoville Jr. Peace Fellowship (Sophy Macartney, (AB ’22); Allie Maloney (AB ’24)). Such opportunities often ease students into careers in foreign service or non-governmental organizations.

Anniversary Celebration

On Friday, September 20^th, the Richard B. Russell Security Leadership Program will host a 20^th anniversary celebration event, and invite all SLP alumni back home. The anniversary celebration aims to connect with long-graduated, mid-career alumni, some of whom participate in the annual D.C. trip.

“I regularly say that the SLP has a rich history of training the next generation of national security leaders,” said Gallagher. “The 20th anniversary provides a chance to celebrate the amazing accomplishments of our alumni and reflect on the pivotal role CITS has played in preparing them for their careers. It’s an opportunity to hear where they are, what they are doing, and to hear about the role CITS played in helping them get there.”

The two-day event will kick off with a dinner hosted by CITS founder and SPIA Professor Emeritus Gary Bertsch. The next day will feature alumni panels on current events in their respective policy areas (e.g. strategic trade management, nonproliferation, and human security), discussions on issues particularly important to CITS (e.g. energy security), lunch, and an evening reception.

In honor of the anniversary event, the SLP is producing a keepsake book for alumni documenting the history of the program, including interviews with program founders, pictures of cohorts over the years, and a notes section for sharing memories and contact information.

Also, the Center has recently moved, from the Holmes-Hunter Building on North Campus to a renovated floor in the former Bank of America building on Clayton Street in downtown Athens. The new offices include meeting spaces, a classroom, a lounge, an elevator, and a workbench bar with a view of downtown.

“A lot of our alum haven’t been here to see our new space,” explained Gallagher. “I wanted there to be a moment where they could form a new vision of where CITS is and what happens here.”

CITS is celebrating other changes as well; the center welcomed a new director, Justin Conrad, in 2018. There has also been an expansion to the center’s focus: while the historic emphasis on issues like non-proliferation and strategic trade management remains, new expertise among international affairs faculty means new spotlights on human security issues and energy security.

“UGA is at the forefront of energy security issues for the whole United States,” said Gallagher. “People think of the development of clean energy solutions, and they may think of places like California, but it is actually happening here in Georgia, and CITS is deeply engaged in that. We want to bring alumni back, catch up on where they are, and show them the new space, but we also want to convey the message that CITS is forward thinking and engaged in these most pressing security issues.”

For more information on the Richard B. Russell Security Leadership Program, or to learn more about the upcoming anniversary event, reach out to [email protected], or email Dr. Maryann Gallagher at [email protected].