During the five years I lived in the Czech Republic, at Anglo American University I earned a Master's of Arts in Humanities, Society, and Culture with emphasis on International Relations.  I also earned a Bachelor's of Arts in Politics and Society with a minor in Journalism.  I published research on Czech Republic's integration within the European Union as affected by the Treaty of Lisbon. "Where National Sovereignty Lies", published in The New Presence: The Prague Journal of Central European Affairs, explored how anti-integration political groups legitimized their Eurosceptic bias with a 1947 treaty on property rights and German expulsion from Czechoslovakia after World War Two. At the time, the other twenty six member states had signed the Lisbon Treaty over a two year period, all of Europe was waiting for the signature of the Czech President, and I was interviewing Czech political elite. Those interviews taught me as much about International Relations as whole classes had. While working on my Masters’, I became a tour guide in Prague’s oldest districts.  As a guide, I turned a thousand years of history into a four hour walking tour and contextual history of the Czech people. My personal goal was to make history relevant to the common tourist.   
Through my internships, I gave presentations on American culture and taught English. I was frequently invited to different English Clubs as a guest speaker and host.  The day before my Masters’ thesis defense, I wrote in my notebook, “29 Sep 2011. I am where I am today because people believed in me, that I was worth the effort, that I could go far with some help and encouragement.”
Between the two internships in October 2011, I participated in a month long live action scenario of war in the Caucasus in which a NATO coalition intervenes. The scenario was 'acted out' in three NATO army bases in Germany and involved thousands of armed forces and hundreds of civilian role players. At Civil Affairs my job was managing Dislocated Civilians and prioritizing their needs. The following month I attended an Advanced Leadership Course in Ft. Dix, New Jersey. There I  learned matrices used to analyze civil infrastructure and perceptions of the people who live in a given area. I was deployed to Afghanistan Fall 2012-Spring 2013 as part of a Civil Affairs Team. While there   tested and applied Civil Affairs Methodology and did first-hand research on US Foreign Policy in Afghanistan from an insider perspective. 
In my proposed Ph.D. dissertation, I plan on using the Civil Affairs methodology to investigate a minority groups' ability to change their perceived cultural identity in relation to centralizing national policies. It will also look at policies that simultaneously strengthen a minority's rights as individual citizens while eroding of the groups’ cultural sovereignty. One reason I want to use the Civil Affairs methodology is to see if once released from US Foreign policy or the military Commander's Intent, it can become accessible to the wide variety of political or non-political NGOs, IGOs, academic groups, and others interested in cross cultural understanding.
