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he Institute for Cuban and Cuban American Studies (ICCAS) has
received a $1 million, first-of-its kind grant from the U.S. Agency
for International Development for the Cuba Transition Project,
an academic program that will examine the multiple issues affecting
Cuba’s transition to democracy.
“The Cuba Transition Project hopes to provide
a future Cuban regime alternative recommendations and proposals
on transition issues, drawing from the Eastern European experience
and the lessons of Nicaragua,” says ICCAS Director Jaime
Suchlicki, who spearheads the project.
The project will focus on three key areas:
• Identifying and assessing the challenges
to a democratic transition in a post-Castro Cuba. Among the issues
the project will address are legal and institutional reforms,
privatization and foreign investments, corruption, education,
and the domestic economy.
• Creating a comprehensive database on Cuba’s economy,
demography, communications, and physical infrastructure. The database,
already online at
http://cuba.sis.miami.edu/, is available
as a free resource to the public. A newsletter on developments
in Cuba also will be published.
• Implementing a professional development and education component.
Once a democratic transition is initiated, this last component
will provide technical assistance and educational programs in
Cuba and Florida for Cuban professionals, civil society leaders,
and potential government officials and policy makers in the areas
of law, economics, business management, and public policy.
 Says
Suchlicki, “This is not a project to tell the Cuban people
what to do in the future. All of the studies that will be carried
out are aimed at providing recommendations. The Cuban people can
accept our recommendations, reject them, or ignore them.”
Scholars involved in the project, he says, “will communicate
as much as possible with the Cuban people to receive input and
reactions to our studies.”
Many of the programs in the Cuba Transition
Project will capitalize on the knowledge and research of nationally
and internationally renowned scholars who study Cuba, bringing
together Cuba experts on a variety of topics from such institutions
as Harvard University, the University of California at Los Angeles,
and Florida International University in Miami.
“The University of Miami is uniquely situated,
as well as academically and culturally equipped, to examine these
important issues,” says UM President Donna E. Shalala. “This
grant underscores the institute’s continued role as a leader
in Cuban studies.”
The project was made possible by the leadership
of several key members of the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives.
“This project demonstrates Congress’ commitment to empowering
the Cuban people as they prepare for the country’s inevitable
transition to democracy,” says Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
who supported the measure in the U.S. House. “The initiative
provides academic institutions and researchers the necessary resources
to make informed assessments that will be of use to future decision-makers.”
Adolfo Franco, assistant administrator for Latin
America and the Caribbean at the U.S. Agency for International
Development, calls the project “a vital new endeavor that
will bring hope to the Cuban people. What we want to see in Cuba
is a government that will be a good neighbor in the hemisphere,
one characterized by strong support for human rights and open
economic markets,” says Franco, who announced the grant at
a press conference on the UM’s Coral Gables campus. “I
know ICCAS is well qualified and well positioned to help assemble
the intellectual resources to help us undertake our preparations
for a free and democratic Cuba.”
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uilding on one of its strongest overall research disciplines,
the University of Miami will now offer a new major in neuroscience
for Bachelor of Science degree students in the College of Arts
and Sciences. It is an expansion of the former major in psychobiology,
which was a joint program between the departments of biology and
psychology.
“It is very timely to have developed an
undergraduate program with the goal of attracting highly qualified
applicants who are aware of the University’s eminence in
neuroscience,” says David Wilson, director of the new program.
“Not only will these students have excellent preparation
for graduate work, medical school, and other health professional
careers, they will be encouraged to be active participants in
the local neuroscience community as well.”
While the major will be offered through the
College of Arts and Sciences, the teaching faculty and coordinating
committee will come from faculty at the School of Medicine, and
possibly from other schools, such as the Rosenstiel School of
Marine and Atmospheric Science.
In the new neuroscience major, students will
have the option to choose between the psychobiology track, which
emphasizes behavioral and cognitive neuroscience, and the neurobiology
track, which will emphasize cellular and molecular neuroscience.
“The new major builds on the strength of
our existing Ph.D. program in neuroscience,” says Wilson.
“We have a large and strong group of faculty who do research
in neuroscience at the University, and the laboratories of these
scientists will offer special opportunities for research experiences.
We know that student interest in the new major is out there. Last
fall, we had 90 students register in the current psychobiology
major.”
A key component of this program is the integration
of neuroscience faculty at the School of Medicine with those on
the Coral Gables campus. Faculty members will cross campuses to
share their expertise with undergraduates, and students will gain
research experience in neuroscience faculty laboratories. Another
component of the new major is the development of several new undergraduate
courses, including a comprehensive neuroscience laboratory course,
a course in the mechanisms of neural diseases, and a developmental
neurobiology class.
Funding from the Innovation and Education Research
Initiative supports the development of the new major.
Currently, the University offers a Ph.D. program
in neuroscience. More than 50 faculty members from 13 departments
on three campuses participate in graduate and postdoctoral training.
They engage in neuroscience research that accounts for more than
20 percent of the University’s federally sponsored research
dollars. In recognition of the importance of neuroscience research,
UM opened the Lois Pope LIFE Center, the new home of the University’s
most visible neuroscience endeavor, The Miami Project to Cure
Paralysis.
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