 OK, good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum. I'm Amanda Molosson. I'm the Education Specialist here. And we are so glad that y'all are here this morning for this very special event. I am going to give you just a couple logistical things, and then I'm going to get the program started. So first, my first request is no cell phone use during the program. That includes photos. We have a photographer, and our photos will be released to you guys after the program, so you'll be able to have those memories preserved. So no cell phones during this. And additionally, please stay in your seat during the program. It's only an hour, so you should be fine. If for any reason you need to leave your seat, please make sure that you take an adult that came with you to exit the bathrooms or wherever you might need to go if there's an emergency. But please try to remain in your seats through the entirety of the program. Following the program, we will take photos with each school with Secretary Albright. So when the program concludes, please remain seated, and I'll come back up to give you direction for that. I would like to introduce Dr. Mark Lawrence. He's a associate professor of history here at the University of Texas, and he's going to introduce the folks on stage today. Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Mark Lawrence, and I teach in the department of history here at UT. It's my enormous privilege to take part in this event with you all. And above all, to have the honor to introduce our guests. First of all, we'll be joined up here shortly on the stage by three students. They are Alejandra Waite from the Ann Richards School, Miranda Groshoni from Austin High School, and last but not least, Piper Newlander from the Liberal Arts and Sciences Academy, better known as Lhasa. Our guest of honor this morning, of course, is Madeleine Albright, who served as US ambassador to the United Nations from 1993 to 1997, and then until 2001 as US Secretary of State. During these years, she presided over American diplomacy during some of the most complicated and consequential events of the post-Cold War era, and consistently advocated for the advancement of democracy and the protection of human rights around the world. What may be a little less known, but very relevant for our purposes today, is how much of her long and illustrious career Secretary Albright devoted to education. She holds her BA from Wellesley College and her MA and PhDs from Columbia. During the 1980s, she was appointed research professor of international affairs at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service and its director of its Women in Foreign Service program. At Georgetown, she won the university's Teacher of the Year Award four times. Since leaving the State Department in 2001, she's returned to teaching at Georgetown while also pursuing other paths. She's chair of the Albright Stonebridge Group and serves on boards and advisory commissions across the country too numerous to mention. In the past few years, she's written several important books on politics and international affairs and has even made guest appearances on the Gilmore Girls and Parks and Recreation. She joins us at the library today to help open an exhibit called Read My Pins, the Madeleine Albright Collection, which features more than 200 pins and broaches from Secretary Albright's personal collection. But she also has very generously offered to spend some time with all of us this morning to consider a broad array of issues of particular interest to young Americans so well represented in this audience. I know I speak on behalf of all of us in saying how grateful we are for her willingness to share some time with us this morning. Please join me in welcoming the 64th US Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright. Thank you so much, Ms. Albright. So the first question, in what ways do you feel diplomacy has changed over the course of your career? Have you seen shifts in values, decorum, modes of presentation? Well, first of all, I'm delighted to be here with all of you, thank you very much. And one of the things that I have insisted on as my pins have traveled around the United States is that there always be some component with students. So I'm delighted to have a chance to be with all of you. I think diplomacy has shifted an awful lot. I think what is interesting, I do teach at Georgetown now and I say foreign policy is just trying to get some country to do what you want, that's all it is. So what are the tools? And my course is called the National Security Toolbox and there are not a lot of tools in that toolbox but diplomacy is one of the major ones and there is bilateral diplomacy when it's relations with one country or multilateral where you're operating within a regional or global organization. What has shifted about it is technology because part of the thing, if you go back and you look at the history of diplomacy and it's going on obviously for a very long time, ambassadors are sent out and they are the eyes and ears of the government and they have in the past to the extent that technology existed sent back reports and they are instructed about what they're supposed to do in the country. So I don't know whether any of you have read for instance David McCulloch's book on John Adams, he disappeared for a couple of years and was in Europe, signed some treaties and then came back and he theoretically didn't get daily instructions. So then what happened when I was in office and it really sounds kind of anti-Diluvian. I didn't have a computer on my desk and I didn't do email and the instructions to the diplomats went out over what's called cable traffic. They would get their instructions and they would then report back what they were doing. So now with technology where everything is instantaneous it has speeded up the whole evolution of ideas but it is also complicated decision-making because people expect you to make a decision right away and if a country has suggested something that may be complicated in terms of the relationship and all of a sudden it is emailed back to Washington then 24 hours later they say, well what have you decided? And so I think that the best way to describe the changes are due to changes in technology some of which are very good because it really does connect people and some of it makes decision-making much, much harder. So I've often said that maybe ambassadors would prefer to go back to the John Adams time when they were kind of on their own and were able to really participate. The other part is, and we're about to witness this, the president or the secretary of state travel a lot more than before and so when the head of state or the secretary of state arrives in a country the question is how do they relate to the ambassador there? Do people save their complaints until the president comes? And so that can just visualize the interpersonal relationship. And by the way, the ambassador in a country actually outranks the secretary of state. So there's a time I arrived in Mexico and what happens is you arrive in a big plane that says United States of America but normally the ambassador or somebody sends a car for you but the then ambassador of Mexico decided not to send a car for me. So I was just kind of sitting there trying to figure out what to do and he made very clear that he outranked me and he needed the car. So the audience might not be able to see it as well but you've become very known for the pins you wear and I was wondering if you could tell everyone the meaning of the pin you're wearing today. Well this is my special Texas pin. It has stars and cowboy boots and hats and is very much a Texas pin. So I love wearing it. I maybe should have had a big horn or something but I need to get one. But I love wearing Texas things. When I first, I always kid about this but my first foreign trip as secretary of state was to Texas and I had a great secretary Baker had invited me to his institute and there I bought a Stetson which I wore when I got off airplanes. Went to show what an American I really was. Well we appreciate having you. What does it mean to you to be a leader and how do the pins you wear show the kind of leader you are? Well I, you know, I'm sometimes asked did I ever expect to have the job that I had and I never did and expected I did love foreign policy. I was not born in the United States. My father was an ambassador, a Czechoslovak ambassador in Yugoslavia and maybe you sometimes have seen on the news pictures of little girls in national costumes that give flowers at the airport. That's what I did for a living. And then because in our family all we ever did was talk about foreign policy. I really loved it. I'd go to every school I went to. I would organize an international relations club, make myself president, that was my sign of leadership and made people come and talk about international relations. But I think that the most important sign of leadership that I have discovered over the years is to listen. I think that it is very important to listen to the people that you work with, listen to whatever kind of job you have either if you're somebody that is an elected official to listen to the people that elected you and listen to the people that you are dealing with and then absorb things but if you never listen then you don't learn. And so for me the biggest sign of leadership is listening. Thank you. Thank you so much. So as an immigrant to America yourself what is your opinion on America's current immigration policy and what changes would you make to the immigration policy and why? So we have a lot of time. Let me just say my story and then kind of fit that all in. What happened was my father was a Czechoslovak diplomat and I've actually been an immigrant twice once in England during the war because he was with the Czechoslovak government in exile and we spent the war in England all through the Blitz and then we went back to Czechoslovakia and then my father became ambassador to Yugoslavia and ambassadors usually have a limited amount of time in a country so his three years were up and they were giving him a new assignment to be the Czechoslovak representative to a new commission on India and Pakistan to deal with Kashmir and he was very pleased to do it and then what happened was the communist who took place in Czechoslovakia in February 1948 and he didn't wanna work for the communists and his best friends in Belgrade were the British and American ambassadors and they said well your country's just had a coup and they have no idea what this is just some new commission. Why don't you stay and do the job but not report to your own government report to us so he agreed to do that. He went to India and Pakistan and I came to the United States with my mother and brother and sister and we lived on Long Island and then moved out to Denver and I was an immigrant and I didn't, I had an English accent but I tried to fit in really all I ever wanted to do was to be an average American teenager which meant reading a lot of comic books and chewing bubble gum and really trying to be like everybody else and it wasn't easy given my very ethnic parents so my mother was this truly delightful nut but she read poems at dinner parties and would predict perfectly terrible things to people and had no control over what she said anyway but everybody loved her and then my father wanted to fit in in Colorado also so which means fishing. The only problem was that he fished in a coat and tie so I had parents and every week, Sunday we'd go and get in the car and go look at the mountains. I mean family solidarity, not anyway. So I didn't become a citizen until I was between my sophomore and junior year in college and so one of the things that I really liked to do once I was in office was to go to naturalization ceremonies and I could never give out, swear people in because I'm not an officer of the law but I could give people their naturalization certificates and the first time I did it was on July 4th, 2000, the millennium in Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home and I give people their certificates and all of a sudden I hear this man saying can you believe it, I'm a refugee and I just got my naturalization certificate from the Secretary of State and I said can you believe it, I am a refugee and I am Secretary of State and I thought that is what America is really about the idea that there is a dream and you can be what you wanna be and if you work hard. I am absolutely appalled by our immigration policy at the moment. I think that people don't leave their countries by choice I think either they really are concerned that they're gonna be punished about something and it is a political issue. I think most people would prefer to live in the country where they're born because they speak the language and they have family so if they leave it's hard work and it's hard to fit in and do various things and I have now spent an awful lot of time on the refugee issue that in fact is created by a number of different things in the Middle East clearly by fighting and the things that are happening in Syria and in Iraq and then some that are coming out of Africa that are technically immigrants but they have been created by climate change. They can't live where they and in Latin America where there are a lot of people who don't can't exist in the countries where they're coming from either because of poverty or drugs or a number of different things. I have driven across America a lot of times it is very large and we have plenty of room. And I went to Jordan for instance which is a country that I spoke to the King of Jordan, King Abdullah and he's describing how many refugees they have there and he said it's as though you have 60 million refugees in the United States. We are having trouble dealing with 11 million undocumented workers, it's ridiculous. And Jordan is a small country in its frontline state and it is doing all of that. The Europeans are dealing with refugees not very well but it is impossible for us to tell them what to do if we are doing less and less and the numbers have been cut down now by President Trump which is even worse. There are bans against people from certain countries coming in and I think it is un-American the way we have been behaving in that. Our country benefits by diversity and I really do think that refugees and immigrants do their best to be really good American citizens and I hope and then the DACA people. I just have to say I just was at a conference and there was a young woman there who was from California and she went through the long story of her family. She was a DACA child. Her mother went back to Mexico, couldn't come out again. Really appalling stories and I have been on Capitol Hill and there are DACA young people wandering around crying saying I went to school just like everybody else and I have a job and I speak English and I belong here and I don't have never been to Honduras or wherever they have come from and so I think it's appalling. It is un-American and I really hope that we have new immigration legislation. And I'm gonna say one more thing. What happened was that when we were in England people would say we're so sorry your country's been taken over by a terrible dictator. You're welcome here. What can we do to help you and when are you going home? When we came to the United States people said we're so sorry your country's been taken over by a terrible system. You're welcome here. What can we do to help you and when will you become a citizen? And my father said that's what made America different from every other country. So you've spoken extensively about the importance of women helping each other and often in the context of competition I think many women and myself included find it hard to lift each other up while also contending for themselves. So how did you keep so on track for consistently fighting for women's issues? Well, I have to say it's kind of a strange story because I went to college sometime between the invention of the iPad and the discovery of fire. And even though I went to a women's college, Wellesley, believe it or not, when we graduated and we all kind of remember this story slightly differently but our commencement speaker was the secretary of defense because his daughter was in our class and he actually said something like you are expected to get married and have children, preferably sons. I mean the fact that we didn't walk out is kind of stunning. Anyway, I did get married three days after graduation and what really did happen was that I wanted to be a journalist and I was married to a journalist and I had been on my college paper and I had a job on a small paper in Missouri and we moved back to Chicago where he already had a job and we're having dinner with his managing editor and he looks at me, I was 22 and he said so what are you gonna do honey? I said I'm gonna work on a newspaper and he said I don't think so. He said you can't work on the same paper as your husband because of labor regulations and even though there were three other papers in Chicago at the time, he said and you wouldn't wanna compete with your husband and I know what I'd say today and probably what you'd say but at that time I kind of saluted and found another life. I went to work for Encyclopedia Britannica. It's a book. So I did that and then was pregnant with twins and I decided that I wanted to go back to school and the reason that my statement about a special place in hell came out is because I found the hardest thing that happened to me were other women who said I don't understand why you're not home with your children, why are you going to graduate school now, you should and then later you should be in the carpool line with them and besides my hollandaise sauce is so much better than yours and I thought why are we doing this to each other? Why are women so judgmental about each other? And that has troubled me all along and I for instance, I did go teach at Georgetown and did run this women's informed policy issue and I always believed that it was very important for women to be a part of whatever career pattern in the way that we can contribute the best but I continued to really think that we weren't helping each other enough and partially, just as an example of something I don't know, it's the being judgmental and then I think that women actually we project our own sense of inadequacy on to other women. So I was campaigning with Geraldine Ferrara when she was the first woman to be on a national ticket and we were somewhere in the middle west and this housewife came up to me and she said, well, how can she talk to a Russian? I can't talk to a Russian. Well, nobody was asking this woman that lived wherever in the middle west to go talk to a Russian but because she couldn't, she projected that and I think we do that a lot or there is what I call the queen bee syndrome if there's only one job for a woman, I'm gonna have it and I don't need anybody else but the bottom line is we are much better off with more than one woman in the room and men are much better off working with us and we with them and so I think it's a question about not being so judgmental and then also having confidence in what we do. So continuing on the women theme, as former secretary of state, you've said that you believed women's issues had to be central to foreign and American policy and made efforts to achieve that. So how did you begin to approach this concept to a group unfamiliar with these ideas? Well, I think the interesting part is that, first of all, it's, I can't say often enough how weird it was that people thought a woman could not be secretary of state and really what did happen was that I had been ambassador of the United Nations and the then secretary of state, Warren Christopher had made clear that he was not going to be there for a second term. So during the period of the fall, there was, I called it the period of the great mentioning who was gonna be secretary of state. So my name was out there because as you and ambassador I was a cabinet member and a member of what's known as the principles committee, which is kind of the national security decision making group. And I was on TV and stuff and so my name was out there. And all of a sudden there were people saying, well, a woman couldn't be secretary of state because Arab countries would not deal with a woman. And so some of the Arab ambassadors of the United Nations got together and said, we've had no problems dealing with ambassador Albright. We wouldn't have any problem dealing with secretary Albright. So that went away. Then somebody at the White House, and I never want to know who said, yes, Madeline's on the list, but she's second tier. So I didn't believe that I'd be secretary of state. I really did not think it would happen. And when it did, it was really something that I was putting together a team and people would say, because I did bring a lot of other women with me. Well, she's afraid of strong men. I mean, there was no way all the time something was going on. The truth is I never would have been secretary of state if it hadn't been for Hillary. And the reason I know that is President Clinton said so publicly. And what he said after I was secretary of state, we often traveled together and I would abroad and I would introduce her and she would introduce him. And he said that during that period of the great mentioning, Hillary would come to him and say, why wouldn't you make Madeline's secretary of state? She expresses your views better than anybody else and agrees with them. And besides it would make your mother very happy. So that is how it happened. But then I become secretary of state and I did see, I saw, I'm gonna go back on saying when I was at the United Nations, there were 183 countries. And it was one of the first times I didn't have to cook lunch myself. So I asked my assistant to invite the other women ambassadors and I get to my house and there are six other women. And the countries were Canada, Kazakhstan, Philippines, Trinidad, Tobago, Jamaica, and Liechtenstein. So I'm the American, so I created a caucus. And we called ourselves the G7. And what we did was lobby on behalf of women's issues. So one of the things that was out there was whether there would be a war crimes tribunal against those who had committed ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and most of the crimes of ignorance women. So it made sense to have women judges. And so the seven of us lobbied for women judges and we managed to get somewhere. And so kind of having a group and having women push, I thought was a good idea. So then I become secretary and I decided that, and not just because I'm a feminist, but because I decided that women's issues really are central to what happens in countries. And when women are politically and economically empowered, we know that the societies are more stable. So that it was as much as anything about good for American foreign policy. And I'm very glad we did that. Me too. And G7 for girls, seven? Mm-hmm, yes. Yeah. And by the way, we were doing a girl thing. We decided that we would always take each other's telephone calls. So some man ambassadors said, I don't understand why you're taking telephone calls from the ambassador to Liechtenstein. And I said, well, have yourself replaced by a woman and I'll be very happy to talk to your country. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let us now shift to questions from the audience. And I have just a couple of guidelines to go over before we start in. Please introduce yourself, your first name and your school. Ask your question from the microphones that are in each aisle and remain at the microphone until your question is answered. Please stick to the questions that you've prepared in advance. We'll alternate from aisle to aisle to allow hopefully each school an opportunity to ask a question. And apologies in advance, we may not make it to every question in our allotted time. Please let's begin with the microphone to your right. Hello, my name is Krista and I'm from the Anertrude School. Secretary Albright, you are the first woman secretary of state, which is phenomenal that you broke that glass ceiling. After that, there have been other female secretaries of states, but we are yet to break the next two glass ceilings, vice president and president. Does that show a decline in our progress or do you think we have furthered a woman's right since you became secretary of state? Well, first of all, as I said, people did not think a woman could be secretary of state. And my youngest granddaughter about eight years ago when she was seven said, so what's the big deal about grandma Maddie being secretary of state? Only girls are secretary of state. And that was true, Condi and Hillary. And now, frankly, to all the young men in the audience, you have a great example, there can be men secretaries of state. You know, so, but I do think that I'm very concerned about the fact that we have not had a woman president or vice president. And we always like to be number one in everything, but other countries have had women heads of state and they're very proud of it. And I find passing strange that we have not been able to do that. I hope very much that we will do it with an appropriate woman. There's some I wouldn't vote for, but I do think that it is something that is for me hard to explain, especially when the last woman candidate was eminently well qualified. So I think, but I am troubled generally in terms of some of the things that make it look as though some of women's issues are going backward. And I think that we can't just kind of sit there and think everything keeps moving forward because it doesn't. And it requires work. And it requires work by women and men because societies are better off when they're co-ed. Thank you. I'm Kayla from Austin High and you had to raise daughters while you were working on your doctorate. So do you think that women in the United States still face disadvantages when attempting to enter higher levels of education or government? And also, what do you believe could be done to make it easier for women to both have and care for their family and succeed professionally? I think it's not easy, believe me. And I think that behind every woman that is doing something in addition to motherhood, there are some helpmates, either a help for a partner or somebody that is willing to help. I think there's always kind of a trade-off and arguments that go on about it, but it's impossible, frankly, to do both things exactly at the same time. And let me just say the following thing. There is no one pattern. I mean, I'm often asked, how did I get from here to there? I think everybody has their own pattern and so thinking that there's only one way to do it is counterproductive because there isn't. I do, I am not a good example in everything, which is that it took me forever to get my PhD. I started when my twins were a year old. They were in junior high and they finally said, mom, if you can't finish your paper, we're not gonna finish ours. So that is really what drove me. But it isn't easy and I think that one has to find a pattern that works for you and deal with the criticism. One of the things that makes me really irritated is that working moms, working women criticize stay-at-home moms and stay-at-home moms criticize working women. And I just think we have to be easier on each other and respect the path that we have chosen, but nothing is easy, believe me. And it isn't given to you and I think that part of the issue is how to have other women that have jobs say, I would like to have a woman X who is more than qualified come and work. Instead of what I said earlier saying, if there's only gonna be one, then I'm the one that's gonna be here. We have to help each other. Please. Hello, I'm Giani from the Amherst School, Secretary Albright. You have stated that nonverbal communication is one of your diplomatic tactics in the form of PINs. How would you say this approach has benefited you when interacting with other groups of people? Well, I hope you all see the show and because they all have stories and they have something to do with foreign policy. But the way it is, and let me just say how it started, I like jewelry, it's a girl thing. And but what happened was I had been sent to the United Nations and it was right after the Gulf War and the ceasefire had been translated into a series of sanctions resolutions and as an instructed ambassador, my assignment was to make sure the sanctions stayed on. So I said perfectly terrible things about Saddam Hussein all the time. He deserved it, he invaded Kuwait. So all of a sudden there was a poem that appeared in the papers in Baghdad comparing me to many things but among them an unparalleled serpent. So I had a snake pin and I decided to wear it whenever we talked about Iraq and all of a sudden the press picked it up and said why are you wearing that snake pin? And I said because I was compared to an unparalleled serpent and I thought well this is fun. So I was the only woman on the security council and I went out and I bought a bunch of costume jewelry to depict whatever I thought we were gonna do on any given day. So on good days I wore flowers and butterflies and balloons and on bad days a lot of carnivorous animals and spiders and things. And the other ambassadors would say what are we gonna do today? And I said read my pins which is how it started. What happened is they really got the message. So for instance the Russians were bugging the State Department and we did what diplomats do once we found the guy listening to us and sent a message to Moscow. But the next time that I met with the Russian Foreign Minister I wore this huge bug and he knew exactly what I was saying. The reason that it worked then was it's a good opener. It really is something people wanna know what they now say what does your pin mean why and the other ministers began to do that. And so it's a good way to open conversation. Men actually have a stupider way of doing it. They say what a nice tie you have. And now that people aren't wearing ties I don't know how they open conversations. Thank you. Please. Hi I'm Kari from Lhasa High School. And so women who become firsts in positions of power are often over scrutinized in a way that men aren't. What is the best strategy in dealing with this constant analyzation? I think I would like to say ignore it but the bottom line is it's not easy. But I think that it is something that is irritating. Is your skirt too short or is your hair too long or whatever. But I think it unfortunately just comes with it. And I think you just have to move on and decide that you are going to be who you are. I think the whole question just generally when you're in public or private life is how much criticism do you listen to and how much do you ignore. I did say some of leadership is about listening. Now the way you look is not something that is germane but I do think that women need to listen just as men do when there are suggestions about could they be doing something better but not exactly in terms of analyzing what people look like or what they wear. Ash Palette from the Ann Richards School. Did anyone assume something about a pin that you wore that was the incorrect message and how did this impact your approach with the pins? That's interesting. I think that yes and no an incorrect message. I think that there was a time that I had on a dove when I was talking about the Middle East and it was a dove that was given to me by Lea Rabin, the widow of Yitzhak Rabin. And she had said that it was having dubs and peace talks was very important. And I remember at one stage when everything was going wrong and I decided that it was time for me to wear something tougher than a dove and I wore a bee. And I think that that was misinterpreted in terms of thinking that all I was gonna do was sting people instead of focusing more on what the peace talks were about. But it's hard to tell, you know. I mean, part of the thing that was interesting was whether why people would begin to look at my shoulder all the time and try to figure out why I was wearing what. And by the way, I wore a pin not long ago when I was in Saudi Arabia and all of a sudden the king, all he did was look at my shoulder and I was trying to figure out what he actually was doing. I can't remember what I had on, but he wasn't really looking at my shoulder. He was looking at a framed picture to the side, which actually were notes that were being sent to him on his iPad by his advisors. So they used the excuse of looking at the pin to get their notes now, I think. Adapted. Please. My name is Anna and I'm from the Lhasa High School. Do you think citizens can change the reputation of the US or does it ultimately come down to the president to define our country? I hope very much that it's up to citizens. Because let me just say this, I was very proud to work for President Clinton and last week I was with President George W. Bush and I was very proud of being with him in terms of how he described what America was about. I have a little bit more trouble traveling abroad at the moment and one of the things that you learn if you're a former diplomat is not to criticize your country when you're abroad and yet people really want to know what is happening here. And so I do think that it is very important for citizens as we all talk to each other and also as we talk to foreign visitors is to talk about what American values are about because ultimately this country is about who the citizens are and I'd mean no criticism of the current president otherwise I might have to ask for political asylum somewhere..(audience laughs and laughs loudly.) Please. My name is Clara, I'm from Lhasa High School. You live through World War II. What are your thoughts on the Nazi and white supremacist rallies in Charlottesville? Are you scared? I think there, it goes back to the previous question a little bit. I think they seem very un-American to me. And I'm in the middle of writing a book at the moment, the title of which is Fascism a Warning. Trying to analyze what happened in Europe and other parts of the world which brought us terrible discrimination and hatred and fighting and bad leaders. And I think that what we have to do is make clear that what is happening in those fights really is not American and it is not something where both sides are equal. I think that is a big mistake. I think that we have to remember what our values are about and discriminating against people and not letting there be free speech and having there be violence is not the way that I see America. But I think that one of the things, I'm so glad you're asking these questions because I find, I do teach in a college level and there's so many discussions now about what is appropriate discussion, or what is the difference between free speech and violence and how do you in fact exchange views with respect? I think that we don't all have to say the same thing or agree on everything. But the worst part is if you will not let the other people speak and if you then resort to violence. But I think this is a very important discussion for all of us, but especially for your age group. My name is Caleb from Austin High School. You were a small child in London during World War II. What is one of your most vivid memories from your childhood? And when you look back on your childhood, what do you remember fondly? Well, let me just say, we moved to England when I was two years old in 1939 after the Germans had invaded Czechoslovakia. And we actually lived in London, in the middle of London and those of you who've been there before nodding, Hillgate got to be a fancy place. And every night, I spent the night in the cellar of this big apartment building. And I went back to visit it when I was writing my book about Prague winter. And all of a sudden, the green paint all vividly came back because it was still the same. And I remember my father saying at some point, well, you have to go to the air raid shelter. And then he would say to my mother, but there are hot water pipes and gas pipes down there. So what would happen if the building were hit? My most vivid example though was we finally moved outside of London and lived in a place called Walton on Thames. And at that stage, they had developed a iron table that people bought for their houses. And theoretically, if you were under the table, if the bomb hit you, you would be saved. And so we slept under the table and we ate on the table and played around the table. And so I kind of grew up used to going to air raid shelters and air raid sirens. The thing though, that was so remarkable about my parents and it was through everything was they made the abnormal seem normal. And so this is kind of how I was. My fond memory, you will laugh, is that I was asked to play a refugee child in a movie that they did during that period. And they gave me a pink rabbit with nice ears. And that was my fond memory of being a refugee. Thank you. Good morning, I'm Rebecca from the Andrews School for Young Women Leaders. Secretary Albright, who would you say is a role model for you as a leader? Well, I, what was interesting when I was growing up through all this, as I said, I did go to a women's college. We had some fabulous professors and they really were my role models. And I could say Eleanor Roosevelt, but I didn't know Eleanor Roosevelt. So most of my role models were men. And they were people that really understood the importance of public service and of involvement. And they were political people. I mean, I worked for a man called Ed Muskie, who was the Senator from Maine. I was his Chief Legislative Assistant. I admired him tremendously because he wouldn't always say when somebody said you're a politician, he said being a politician is actually a good thing to be. It is a position in which you are the intermediary between the government and the people. And any number of things that he really was fantastic about. Vice President Mondale was a very good role model. It was Big Knift Brzezinski, people that I worked with. And then my parents, because they, as I said earlier, we went through an awful lot of stuff together and they really did make the abnormal seem normal. And my father had been a diplomat and a professor. And I'm gonna tell you this story. He taught at the University of Denver. And he died in 1977. He was a pretty big deal by then. And there was funeral with lots of flowers and tributes and things. And among them was this ceramic pot in the shape of a piano with just some leaves in it. So I said to my mother, where did this come from? And she said, it's from your father's favorite student, Condoleezza Rice, which is really kind of stunning. And I was with Condoleezza Rice last week and she said that she owed a great deal to my father who persuaded her to be an international relations major. She got her master's at Notre Dame and then came back to work on her dissertation with my father. So this African-American music major wrote her dissertation on the Czechoslovak military. And so he was a great role model, not only for me, but for her. Thank you. Back to the side. Hi, I'm Sarah from Austin High School. And my question is, you were famously called a serpent by the Iraqi media. How did you deal with a foreign representative or leader that was being openly hostile or disrespectful in meetings or negotiations? Do you think the hostility would have been as pronounced if you had been a male diplomat? I think that the hostility would not have been as pronounced if I'd been a male diplomat because I think that they thought that they could be rude to me. But let me just say, what is interesting, there are two parts to this, I think. There's no question that when you arrive a secretary of state in a large airplane that says United States of America, they know they have to deal with you no matter what gender you are. But I do think that there is a certain amount of condescension that went on. And part of what I used to do was, for instance, when I dealt with President Milosevic of Serbia, and this is what happened, my life is such a series of coincidences. The fact that my father was Ambassador to Yugoslavia and I actually learned to speak Serbian and understood them, when I met with him and he was trying to describe Serb history to me in some way that was wrong, I said, you don't need to tell me about Serb history. I know the history, but I also know what you're doing now to the people in Bosnia. The hard part for me, however, was he was trying to charm me and as an American, you try this sometime, try shaking hands and not smiling. It's kind of like an automatic movement. So if you look at pictures of me from there, I'm just gritting my teeth trying desperately not to. But the thing that would happen in any number of meetings, we'd start out with pleasantries and then I'd say, I have come a long way, so I must be frank. And I think people discover that I could be pretty tough, but I think you do have to prove something. But you also have to read the intentions of the party on the other side of the table. So you can't just generalize, but you have to be proud of what you're doing in your country and the message you're delivering and be prepared to be tough. Thank you. Hello, my name is Anais Nayatan, the Anne Richards School for Young Women Leaders, Secretary Albright. What character traits are important for someone involved in politics and consistently interacting with government officials from different countries? Well, I think several things. I think one of the part that is very important is to put yourself into the shoes of the person you're talking to on the other side of the table. And to really understand that if you're going to have a relationship with another country, that you need to know what their national interests are and what it is they need. Not everything can be a zero sum game. So that's the main part, is to really be very well briefed about the country you're going to and the person that you're talking with. That is absolutely essential. I also think that what is important is to understand all the issues that are out there and how far you can go on a particular issue because you have your instructions and that person has his or her instructions. And I think that it is important to understand what the whole thing is about. And part of the problem is that I think people are not well enough briefed about what is going on. You really do depend on the people in your own government to tell you what the purpose of a particular meeting is and how you behave with the person at the other side of the table. I think also that, so that part, the other part I think is that you have to learn to take criticism, not just about the way you look as the way I said, but you develop a thick skin. I used to say that the reason I looked so fat was that I developed a thicker skin. The reason I looked so fat, which was the other part, is when you go to some country and you have to eat what they serve you, I had, as an American and as a woman, I always sat next to the head of state and I finally thought I'd just move the stuff around my plate and they would look at me and say, why aren't you eating our national whatever? And then you had to eat it. So I was actually eating from my country, but the bottom line is you do have to develop the thicker skin and try not to feel that these are personal attacks on you. And then the other hard part is reading about yourself in the newspapers, which is not always pleasant. Thank you. Please. Hi, I'm Sarita from Lhasa High School. You've expressed disdain with the US's invasion of Iraq and many people compare that war to our involvement in the Vietnam War. Do you think we will ever learn from mistakes like these? We should, but let me just say, and this is the very hard part about it, is, and it's a larger question in terms of what are America's responsibilities in the world and why do we get involved in wars? And again, all decision makers have baggage, our own baggage with us. And again, mine, for instance, was because I was born in Czechoslovakia, and those of you that have studied the pre-World War II period, the watershed event for Czechoslovakia was the Munich Agreement, where in fact, the British and French made a deal with the Germans and Italians over the heads of the Czechoslovaks. America wasn't there, and so the country where I was born was kind of sold down the river. Then when the Americans came in during World War II, and I was this little girl in England, everything changed. And then after the war, when Americans did not liberate Czechoslovakia, but the Soviet Union did, everything changed again. And so I have really believed that it's important for America to be engaged with others in terms of trying to help where we possibly can. But I think one has to make the judgment about what is the war about, and is there a difference we can make, and under what auspices do we go in? So the Vietnam War is obviously a very complicated one, and I believed at that time that we were fighting the communists, and so I can understand how we got into it. The Iraq War, I think, I obviously I was older and I understood it better, I think we went in for a different reason. And part of it was the fear factor of reasons that things weren't explained to us very well. So I think the most important thing is to understand what the situation is in a war. Can the, and should the United States do something? Do we do something unilaterally or multilaterally? And what is the truth? I think the problem that comes out with, I've been watching the Vietnam series, and I think that a lot of events come out later where at the time the decision makers didn't have all the information, so it's easy to say, how could you have been, how could you have done that? And other times, citizens are denied knowledge, and I think that's what happened on Iraq. But it's not always the same mistake, but we do make mistakes, and we have different ways we're viewing things, and I think this is one of the hardest questions is what is the role of the United States in the world these days? And the job of the President of the United States is to protect our territory, our people, and our way of life. And even that gets harder to define because our people wanna travel around the world, they wanna do business around the world, and we do not like it when people are being killed for no reason except who they are, not anything that they've done. And so these are the huge questions that decision makers have to deal with, and you as citizens and people that are going to be decision makers need to figure out each situation is slightly different, but it all revolves around what should be the appropriate role of the United States, and if we are not involved, do worse things happen? And I think that's the question that people have to ask ourselves. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm very sorry to say that we have run out of time, and I apologize in particular to those of you who still have questions to pose. Fortunately, our event is not entirely at an end. Secretary Albright has offered to pose for some photos, and I'll invite Amanda Molanson to come up and to manage that process. But before I cede the podium, I just wanna say a big word of thanks to all of you, to all of those who made this event such a success, to Alejandra, to Miranda, and to Piper for the great questions, and above all to Secretary Albright. Thank you so much for being with us. Well, and for the terrific questions and for your attention, and I have to say that last question is very thought provoking and is the basis of everything that we all need to think about. What is the role of the United States? How do the citizens react, and what are our responsibilities to each other and as humankind to each other? So thanks for asking that, and I think that you have posed a lot of questions that were difficult for me to answer, and will be difficult for all of you to think about, but they were very, very important, and you're all terrific, and your teachers are terrific, and I'm very, very happy to have been here. Thank you. Thank you.