GLOA MA alumna Patricia Janer meets people from around the world every day as she organizes tours at the World Bank Visitor’s Center. Patricia, who graduated in Spring 2018, spent a year as volunteer docent training to learn the intricate details of the history of the international institution, it changing mission, and its projects around the world.
Patricia started work in 2017 as a volunteer docent and recently accepted a fulltime time job with the World Bank as the Vistior Center’s Docent Coordinator. Most people don’t know that That the World Bank has a huge collection of art pieces made by emerging artists from member countries. The collection has almost 6,000 pieces and this collection started in 1997 when then-WB president James Wolfersohn established an Art Department as another way of engaging in international development. He had a more holistic approach on international development, as he thought that art, education, healthcare, environment issues, etc. were as equally important to deal with as economic and structural development issues. More than 90% of the art is displayed in the executive offices and hallways at the Washington headquarters and country offices around the world. The art at the visitor center is a minuscule sample of the collection. All pieces highlight issues in international development, but also in global affairs.
Patricia is thrilled that she uses what she learned in her Global Affairs classes on a daily basis in her job. you use your Global Affairs degree at your job? “When I lead a tour at the Visitor Center, I try to relate the World Bank’s history to World History. I basically demonstrate how world issues and events have had an impact on the mission and goals of the World Bank. For example, I make sure that visitors see that the membership of African Countries immediately after their decolonization processes changed the mission of the World Bank from a purely reconstruction approach to a structural development. Another pivotal moment for the World Bank was when Russia and the Former Soviet Republics joined the organization in 1992, because until then, the World Bank was seen as a Western-led institution.”
GLOA Director Lisa Breglia tries the virtual reality tour of remote project locations
Patricia enjoys working with a diverse group of people in the visitor’s center. “I get to work with a very diverse group of people every single day. As a docent coordinator, I work with a group of 19 people; some are retired staff of the World Bank and others are undergraduate and graduate students from universities in the area (there is a spectacular docent from Mason). I’ve learned a lot from the retirees, I consider some of them as my mentors.” If you would like to be a docent at the World Bank Visitor’s Center, email us at gloa@gmu.edu and we’ll tell you how you can do an internship for credit working with Patricia!
October 17, 2018