Gulf Coast Citizen Diplomacy Council

For ten days in July, the Gulf Coast Citizen Diplomacy Council hosted the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program (IYLEP) for the second consecutive summer.  IYLEP is a leadership and cultural exchange program sponsored by the US Embassy in Baghdad which selects students from cities across Iraq as its participants.   

IYLEP is designed to develop skills in leadership, conflict resolution, team-building, and youth activism.  Nine of the selected students and one chaperone came to Pensacola as part of their month-long national program.  Each stayed with a host family while to give them the opportunity to learn about American culture and family life.  The Gulf Coast Citizen Diplomacy Council also selected local high school students to join the Pensacola portion of IYLEP, giving all a chance to interact and learn about each other while building leadership skills.  Council interns Jennifer Reid and Matthew Rizzo served as team leaders for the project.

The itinerary was divided into four categories, volunteer activities, workshops, social activities, and traditional meetings.  As a result, a typical day included a variety of experiences.  A tour of Historic Pensacola Village, a session of icebreakers at Alabama Square, a canoeing trip down the Blackwater River, and games at Big Lagoon State Park all were part of the schedule alongside attending a meeting of the Escambia County Board of County Commissioners, seeing the National Naval Aviation Museum, and learning about area history and ecology at Fort Pickens.  While with the Perdido Tribe Creek Indians, the students examined educational outreach and the history of Native Americans with Chief Bearheart, and at the Office of Diversity and International Education at the University of West Florida (UWF), Rachel Errington and Shigeko Honda shared information on the international programs offered at UWF.  At Digital Media Education (dMe) the Iraqi students learned how to create, film, and edit videos through actual industry techniques, and at WEAR TV the group observed the filming of the evening newscast. 

Volunteerism played a huge role in the week.  Students worked with Feeding the Hungry Plus at First United Methodist Church, helped at the Ronald McDonald House, and acted as mentors with Students Taking Responsibility in Developing Excellence (STRIDE), a community-based mentorship program that works with at-risk fourth and fifth grade male students; and after attending two different public speaking workshops, one led by Florida State University graduate student Terry Epps, and the other by Meiga Loho-Noya, a graduate student with the University of West Florida (UWF) Communication Arts Department, the group toured the Pensacola Boys Base and gave speeches on Iraqi culture and history to the residents of that moderate-risk halfway house.

The week’s activities culminated at an awards ceremony where Maren DeWeese, president of the city council, commended the group for its participation in IYLEP and presented each member with a certificate, a group photo, and a copy of the video that was made by the Iraqi students and the staff at dMe. 

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the generosity of local families in welcoming students to their homes.  Thank you, host families, for sharing your lives with our students and for helping to create bonds of friendship between our city and the people of Iraq.