Ex-Warren resident is Fulbright Scholar

Susan Penksa began studying the Balkans region as a
graduate student.

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — A former Warren resident has been selected as a Fulbright Scholar to study in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Dr. Susan Penksa, now an associate professor of political science at Westmont College here, will conduct research and lecture in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina from August through December.

She was picked as a Fulbright Scholar by the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

Penksa, daughter of Albert Penksa of Niles and the late Susan Fisher, is a 1988 graduate of Warren Western Reserve High School. Her grandmother, Rosemary Braden, was a lifelong Warren resident and recently moved to Texas.

Penksa did her undergraduate work at Gordon College in Wenham, Mass., and returned to Ohio to earn both a master’s and doctorate from Miami University of Ohio.

She is an international security and development consultant and has built a consulting practice with national governments, the European Union, NATO, the United Nations and a number of nongovernmental organizations.

Penksa is regarded as a specialist in international conflict management and crisis response, trans-Atlantic relations, European security, post-conflict reconstruction, democratization and governance and security sector reform.

What’s involved

Her work as a Fulbright Scholar will involve evaluating the process of post-conflict police restructuring with a focus on the role of the European Union.

Her research will also include a collaborative study regarding the effectiveness of European Union strategies for addressing organized crime in Bosnia and the Balkan region.

Penksa recently traveled to Pakistan, where she consulted with the economic growth department of the U.S. Agency for International Development, focusing on mechanisms for increasing women’s economic empowerment.

She has taught at Westmont for more than 10 years and was awarded the college’s Faculty Research Award in 2005. She was named Outstanding Teacher of the Year in 2004.

She began studying the Balkans as a graduate student when the war in former Yugoslavia was in its early stages.

She lectured on the ethnic cleansing that was occurring in hopes of drawing citizen concern and action to the atrocities.

“From that moment, I became determined to maintain a personal and professional commitment to the people of former Yugoslavia,” she said.