A New Focus for the Hughes Center

Carla Barqueiro started at Goucher this semester as an assistant professor of international relations. She’s also the new director of the Sarah T. Hughes Center for Politics, which under her leadership is adapting its mandate to focus on global politics and world affairs.

Barqueiro is well suited to lead the Hughes Center as it is brought into alignment with Goucher’s core pillar of global education. She has experience working in government in diplomacy and has also worked in think tanks and in the nonprofit sector. “I was really impressed with the work that the center has done and really excited about the opportunity to add a more global tone and focus,” she said.

She has already organized and brought experts on world politics for two speaker events at Goucher as part of the new focus. On November 4, the center co-hosted an event with the Baltimore Council on Foreign Affairs (BCFA) called “The United States & Africa: Changing Priorities.” The event featured former U.S. Ambassador and U.S. Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy, who served in several presidential administrations, and the National Democratic Institute’s Senior Associate for Africa Christopher Fomunyoh. “We had two people from different ideological perspectives in conversation with one another about how the U.S. is relating to the region,” said Barqueiro. On December 2, the Hughes Center and the BCFA co-hosted “Trump’s Russia Policy: A Report Card,” featuring Andrew Weiss, the vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who spoke about the U.S. relationship with Russia and the war in Ukraine.

Beyond U.S. foreign policy, Barqueiro plans for programming at Goucher that will take on world affairs at large, including civil society organizations, transnational movements to connect people across borders, migration, and other topics that are at the highest levels of priority today.

While part of the Hughes Center’s new mandate is to bring programming on global politics to the public in Baltimore, there’s also a renewed focus on engaging students at Goucher. Hughes Center funding will help bring students to Model UN in Boston next semester, and Barqueiro has a long-term goal of bringing more students to work directly with the center.

She also emphasizes how important it is for students to meet people who work in world affairs. “One of the things I always tell my students is that having the opportunity to be exposed to the practitioner side of some of the work in world affairs is really useful,” she said. “I’m really happy with how they’ve engaged with the speakers so far. They ask great questions. Our students are the best cohort I’ve ever had the opportunity to teach. And I’m excited to see how they engage going forward.”