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Known as a professional student, I have always sought out situations that exposed me to new ideas, ways of working, processes, and people.
"Yelling at someone who disagrees with you does not make them smarter."
Lynne Platt’s career of U.S. Government service spanned 31 years, 24 of them in the U.S. Foreign Service. She retired in 2018 with the rank of Minister-Counselor, having worked overseas in Cairo (1995-1997), Casablanca (1995-1997) USNATO (2001-2004), Paris (2004-2008), Baghdad (2008-2009), Port-au-Prince (2009-2011), London (2011-2014), and Vancouver (2014-2017) as Consul General. Domestically, she served in the State Department’s Near East Asia Bureau (1999-2000) and at the non-partisan Wilson Center as senior State Department Fellow at the Canada Institute (2017-2018). Lynne received her BA (Phi Beta Kappa) and MA in Political Science from the University of Washington. She and her husband recently relocated to Saint Petersburg, Florida.
Thomas W. Smith is Professor of Political Science and Associate Dean of the Judy Genshaft Honors College at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg. He holds a B.A. in Anthropology from the College of William & Mary and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia. He has taught at USF since 2000. From 1997-2000 Dr. Smith was an assistant professor of International Relations at Koç University in Istanbul. During the summer of 1999 he was a visiting scholar at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. He spent the 2007-2008 academic year at Stanford University.
Robert Sattin, President of The Appleton Group, Lawyer – After over 33 years in the private practice of law in Hartford, CT, Bob came to St. Petersburg where he spent 8 years as the president of The Appleton Group, which developed and ran a network of over 270 law and accounting firms located in 100 countries. In that position, Bob not only interacted with member firms around the world, but also led semi-annual conferences in Europe, N. America, S. America and Asia.
Finance executive with experience in the US, Canada, France, Italy, United Kingdom, Netherlands, and Germany.
Retired CFO for International business, consulting in the US and Canada.
Marcia S. Cohen holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Education from Roosevelt University of Chicago, a Master’s degree in Music Composition from Northwestern University, and received her Juris Doctor degree from Stetson University College of Law. Since becoming a member of The Florida Bar, she practiced almost exclusively in the area of labor and employment law with a concentration in employment discrimination. Ms. Cohen currently serves on The Florida Orchestra Board of Consultants and the Pinellas County ACLU Legal Panel. She likes to sing jazz weekly at the Hangar restaurant in downtown St. Pete.
Douglas L. McElhaney is an American diplomat. He served as the Ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina 2004–2007. Doug is the instigator of the St Pete Conference on World Affairs, having participated in a similar event last year in Boulder, Colorado. When he moved to St. Petersburg in 2007 to take care of aging parents, he noted that international issues did not get the time and attention in the lives of busy Floridians that they warranted.
William Jordan served for 30 years (1981-2011) as a political officer in the U.S. Foreign Service specializing in the Arab world and France. His overseas assignments included Dhahran, Saudi Arabia; Tunis, Tunisia; Damascus, Syria; Amman, Jordan; Paris, France; and Algiers, Algeria, where he served in his final posting as Deputy Chief of Mission.
Maurice has a BA from Eckerd College where he spent much of his time honing sailing skills which morphed into several years as a sailing pro. From there he entered small manufacturing, becoming a design engineer and project manager with an award-winning consortium in the development, fabrication, and installation of “hands-on” interactive exhibit activities for science and children’s museums. His creations are found in prominent institutions nationwide in the USA, the UK, Brazil, and Egypt.
Diane Seligsohn is an American journalist and university lecturer who has lived in Paris for over 3 decades and now divides her time between France and St Petersburg, Florida. Diane received her BA from McGill University in Montreal, Canada and her MA from NYU. She began her career in journalism at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s New York office, where she worked for 5 years before moving to France.
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