The Foreign Service Journal, February 2009

6 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 0 9 What Else Could They Want? I strongly agree with the November letter by Rick Polney regarding the State Department’s new process for hiring Foreign Service officers. The Qualifications Evaluation Panel’s deci- sionmaking process is mysterious in- deed. It lacks transparency and has resulted in the rejection of highly qual- ified candidates. LikeMr. Polney, my wife passed the Foreign Service written exam but was not invited to take the oral exam, even though she was a State Department in- tern overseas three times. A French major in college who also speaks Span- ish, she has a master’s degree in inter- national relations from The George Washington University. Upon graduating, she joined the State Department as a civil servant and served as the Armenia desk officer, a job normally held by an FSO. She was promoted rapidly to GS-13 in the Civil Service, and briefed a Cabinet mem- ber before his trip to Asia. She is cur- rently working at one of our more difficult hardship posts, Havana. Yet despite almost 10 years at the State Department, a relevant educa- tion for foreign affairs work, a proven ability to work at multiple diplomatic missions abroad including a hardship post, experience as a desk officer, and a passing mark on the written exam, she is told she is not qualified to take the orals? When I asked the director general’s office what she would have to do to qualify, the response was “We don’t know” and “The board makes the de- cisions,” as though no department offi- cial is responsible for the board’s crea- tion, operations or results. Robert Ward FSO U.S. Interest Section Havana Communication and Dissent One of the most persistent attrib- utes of the Foreign Service is our ap- parent inability to speak meaningfully to the broader American public. This is puzzling given our professional com- mitment to, and real expertise in, com- munication with the world outside of the United States — that “Vast Exter- nal Realm.” In fact, we have much to say and much to be proud of. The November and December issues of the Journal in- cluded the annual call for AFSA award nominations. The dissent awards pro- gram, now in its 40th year, is unique in the U.S. government — yet few know about it outside our own community. When I described the program to military colleagues at the U.S. Pacific Command a few years ago, they were astonished, remarking that there was no chance such a program could exist among Defense Department employ- ees or probably any other federal agency. The dissent program counters every cliché about “striped-pants diplomats” and deserves to be much better known. To get this message out, I suggest that AFSA move the dissent award an- nouncement from the AFSANews sec- tion of the Journal to the main section, and feature it on the cover with photos of the winners (as most American news magazines from Time to People do). AFSA should also seek out “pa- trons” for the dissent program. If the incumbent Secretary of State is not in- terested, past secretaries might be. Even better might be the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. In any case, there must be prominent non- partisan or bipartisan personalities who would be interested. With these steps, it might be possi- ble to obtain wider media coverage for a good human interest story. I urge the AFSA president and Governing Board to consider this proposal. My bet is that large numbers of AFSA members would approve of this approach. Edward Marks Ambassador, retired Washington, D.C. L ETTERS