Master’s students Micah Pickus and Cody Arigo have been awarded Boren Fellowships to study in central and southern Asia. Boren Awards are an initiative of the Defense Language and National Security Education Office where students from diverse fields of study fully engage with the customs and traditions of world regions that are not well-represented in study abroad programs, such as Africa, Asia, Eurasia, Latin America and the Middle East. Boren Fellows have a strong desire to work in public service, specifically in the federal national security domain, and in exchange for receiving funding, commit to working in the federal government for at least one year following their graduation.
For Micah Pickus, this fellowship has been three years in the making. He was unable to embark on his first Boren Fellowship, awarded in 2020, due to pandemic-related travel restrictions. His deep passion for and desire to cement his mastery of studying the Russian language drew him to Almaty, Kazakhstan which Pickus notes is “arguably the safest place outside of Russia to study Russian in an immersive environment.” Pickus continues, “I am excited for the chance to finally study and live abroad in a Russian-speaking community where I know I will maximize the opportunity to improve my Russian, and probably learn some Kazakh too.” Pickus seeks to gain near-native fluency in Russian, a goal that is partly due to the fact that his paternal great-grandfather was the last one in his family to speak Russian but stopped speaking it when he emigrated to the United States.
He is also eager to connect with the Jewish community in Almaty, which Pickus notes is quite robust. “I am always fascinated when I meet other Jews from around the world and can hear their stories about how their community was founded and how it has endured in a place where Jews are a minority group amongst minority groups.”
Studying Russian in a central Asian country like Kazakhstan will not only help improve my Russian skills but it will also enable me to get a sense of how the socioeconomic, political and cultural aspects of a central Asian nation really manifest themselves in day to day life.Micah Pickus
Motivated in part by his desire to see more of the world and expand his knowledge of societal, political, regional and economic climates in former Soviet satellite states like Kazakhstan, Pickus emphasizes, “as Russia continues to wage war in Ukraine, regions like central Asia and the Caucasus region have become increasingly more geopolitically significant. Studying Russian in a central Asian country like Kazakhstan will not only help improve my Russian skills but it will also enable me to get a sense of how the socioeconomic, political and cultural aspects of a central Asian nation really manifest themselves in day to day life.”
Pickus is looking forward to connecting with people in Kazakhstan through music, sports and food, noting that those are “powerful tools for connecting with people, even if there is a slight language barrier.” He intends to ship his guitar overseas with the aim of not only sharing his music with his peers and the community, but also soaking up the local music scene and learning new local tunes and songs. Being a soccer enthusiast, he looks forward to catching some games from the Kazakh Premier League, and he is excited at the prospect of sampling authentic Kazakh cuisine.
When thinking about his future career and goals, Pickus acknowledges, “Between working for the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) last summer and as a visiting research assistant for the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), I know that I found the exact kind of open source Russian language or intelligence analysis jobs that I’d like to pursue full time. Thus, I am especially excited about the prospects of studying abroad in Kazakhstan where I can improve my Russian language skills to the level that the U.S. government likes its Russian language analysts to possess. Specifically, I’d like to work for the U.S. Department of State or Department of Defense as a Russian subject matter expert or as a Russian-language open source analyst.”
For Cody Arigo, his prior role as a Peace Corps volunteer in the central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan fueled his interest in a foreign affairs and public service career. This ultimately led him to pursue a Master of Public Policy to help launch his ideal career in public service with a focus on international affairs in Asia. The more classes he took on global governance and international security, the more his interest grew in security. He then enrolled in a civil conflict class where he studied Pakistan’s struggles with insurgent and terrorist activities by extremists from within and on its borders. Due to safety and security concerns, it is impossible for Boren Fellows to study in Pakistan, therefore Arigo will study in India.
“Because of my MPP capstone project this year, my second year here at SPP has gotten me more interested in India’s role in the U.S.-led Quadrilateral Security Dialogue,” notes Arigo. “The language I will study in India, Urdu, is a language that is spoken predominantly by India’s Muslim minority population, and also has some similar cognates to the Kyrgyz language I learned while a Peace Corps volunteer in Kyrgyzstan.” Arigo will begin his fellowship this summer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s South Asian Summer Language Institute where he will intensively study Urdu. He will then travel to Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India through at least the end of 2023 with the option to extend his stay for the spring 2024 semester.
Studying in a complex and nuanced country like India will be a great experience to not only learn a critical language, but also gain critical experience in a place where human rights concerns, worries of democratic backsliding, counterterrorism issues, climate change challenges, and the use of science and technology for great power competition with China are all happening simultaneously.Cody Arigo
Growing up with working-class parents, Arigo watched as his father went back to school to obtain his associate’s degree at middle age while also working full time for a railroad company. Inspired by his father’s experience, Arigo wanted to travel beyond the limits of his home town, explore new places, meet people from different cultures and be open to new experiences that would broaden his worldview. “Studying in a complex and nuanced country like India will be a great experience to not only learn a critical language, but also gain critical experience in a place where human rights concerns, worries of democratic backsliding, counterterrorism issues, climate change challenges, and the use of science and technology for great power competition with China are all happening simultaneously.”
Excited to immerse himself in the language and lifestyle of a foreign country again, Arigo is most looking forward to “learning the aspects of South Asian culture, dynamics of Indian society, and the Urdu language that one can’t get from reading a book or opening their laptop.”
Looking ahead to his future career, Arigo plans to pursue a civil service career in one of the eighteen agencies in the Intelligence Agency, the Department of State, or the Department of Defense, with a focus on countries in south and central Asia. Once he returns from India, Arigo declares, “I plan to use the spare time I have to pursue the gauntlet of hurdles it takes to become a foreign service officer.”
To students considering a study abroad program, Arigo recommends, “Move beyond your comfort zone to really find what you are passionate about. I didn’t truly find my passion until I was living 7,000 feet above sea level as a Peace Corps volunteer in a small village of 1,500 people where no one but one person spoke any English … It was also here, beyond a college campus and beyond my hometown or a dead-end bartending job, where I began to see the world from an independent point of view and began to realize what impact I wanted to have on the world … Take the chance so you don’t have to spend late nights wondering ‘what if.’”
