Despite recent political tensions between the United States and Cuba, University administrators are in the initial stages of planning a Duke in Havana program for students interested in studying abroad in the Latin American country for a semester.
The fact that the two nations are connected historically was one of the motivating factors that got the program's development underway. "Despite the lack of an appropriate political relationship between the two countries, we have shared our history," said Richard White, dean of Trinity College and vice provost for undergraduate education. "Because of the willingness of the Cubans to look at the experience in a positive light, the possibilities for such a program to be a success look good."
Yet relations between the United States and Cuba-which has been under the communist rule of Fidel Castro for more than three decades-have been unstable ever since the Cuban military shot down two U.S.-registered civil aircraft in February, violating international aviation law. The mounting political tensions have not only raised questions about the safety of those who visit Cuba, but they have also made it more challenging-although not impossible-to approve educational programs such as Duke in Havana.
Despite these hurdles, both Duke's and other universities' administrators who have traveled to Cuba have said repeatedly that the safety of American students will not be in jeopardy because both they and Cuban officials differentiate between governmental and educational activity. "There seems to be more talk about problems than there are problems," White said. "The reality of the situation over there is much different than what it is considered to be from over here."
Nicholas Robins, program director of Tulane Summer in Cuba, agreed with White, saying that Havana is the safest city of its size in Latin America. "They have a police force here in Havana that is honest and does enforce the law," he said in a phone interview from Cuba. "Also, they are aware that the success of their economy depends on tourists."
Other faculty members at the University have also expressed their support for the Duke in Havana program. Although Albert Eldridge, associate professor of political science, said in a statement that Cuba is one of the "obvious places we can't travel to right now," he said in a phone interview that he supported the program's creation. "Traditional hospitality is such that U.S. students would be not only more than welcomed, the Cubans would go out of their way to make them feel comfortable," he said. "The rest of the world is trading with Cuba, so it makes it perplexing as to why we're still following Cold War policies."
The Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act, authored by U.S. Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, could be considered one of these policies, as it makes it difficult for American businesses to secure contracts and transactions with Cubans and intends to cut off the flow of American currency to Cuba. The policy's sponsors worry that American businessmen will go south of the border for cheap labor, inadvertently damaging the U.S. economy. And although the act does not directly address educational exchanges, it does hold several implications for study abroad programs to Cuba.
Hal Eren, a licensing officer with the U.S. Treasury Department, said that although there is no limit to the number of students who can go to Cuba at any one time, each individual student and his school must apply for licenses to travel and study there. In its application for the license, the University must delineate all activities in which it will participate, as well as the purposes for such a program, Eren said.
Although Helms' office had no specific stance on educational exchanges with Cuba, Mark Theissen, an aid to Helms and spokesman for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Helms chairs, said that the committee is opposed to groups who use the guise of religion and education to promote pro-Castro activism.
Although other institutions such as Tulane University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have launched similar programs in which students travel to Cuba for summer sessions spanning the course of several weeks, Duke will be one of the first institutions to initiate a full-semester program in Cuba for its undergraduate students, White said.
Students participating in the Tulane program just completed their first two-week summer session and Robins said that although he encountered a few logistical problems when getting the program started, it has been a success. "We work with a non-government organization that serves as a host for the students," he said. "We have developed an academic rather than ideological curriculum which promotes dialogue and exposes students to a variety of views."
University officials have not yet discussed the specifics of the curriculum they intend to implement, but they have begun to examine the advantages and disadvantages of such a program.
Both White and Josefina Tiryakian, senior coordinator of programs for the Center for International Studies, spent 10 days in Cuba speaking with administrators from the Universities of Havana and Matazas-both of which are in the southern region of the country. The two institutions, Tiryakian said, complement each other: While Havana covers the arts and sciences, Matazas specializes in engineering and technological programs.
Administrators said they plan to take their time in developing the new program, but added that they hoped to present a rough draft of some general ideas to a faculty committee in the fall. "I don't know when such a program would happen," White said. "It would depend on the way the political wind blows."
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