It had been part of Blake Stilwell’s yearly routine for the past four years: send application for student visa to travel to North Korea.

“This year I did it and three days later I got, ‘OK you’re accepted,’ and I was like, ‘holy s***. Like, I don’t know what to do now,’” he said. “I’ve never made it this far.”

North Korea and the United States don’t have a diplomatic relationship and the strain means there is little interaction among the people of the two countries. North Korea is hardly a destination spot for U.S. citizens, college students don’t study abroad there and the barrier remains.

Syracuse University professors and university officials have long worked to break down barriers with North Korea, and SU is one of the only universities to have an ongoing relationship with the country. Through academic exchange programs that first began in 2002, SU has put the politics aside and forged a relationship using what the university knows best: knowledge.

Stilwell, a public diplomacy graduate student in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, traveled to North Korea with two fellow students in public diplomacy, Nadia Hakim and Cameo Cheung.

Their trip was made possible with the help of the Korean Friendship Association, run by a Spanish national who works for the government of North Korea.

Though Stilwell, Cheung and Hakim did not travel to North Korea through a program at SU, they said the support they received from various faculty members, such as Dean Lorraine Branham of Newhouse, attests to the kind of institution SU is.

“If we don’t have a relationship with North Korea, well if SU doesn’t, who will? We can’t wait around for someone to jump on board with this,” Hakim said.

In 2001, Stuart Thorson, a professor of political science, and Tom Harblin, former vice president of global development, approached the Korea Society, based out of New York City, and asked for its help in creating an exchange program with a university in North Korea, said Fred Carriere, who worked at the Korea Society in 2001 and is now a professor at SU.

“(The program was about) seeing if we can find ways to work together that don’t involve big political issues and try to build the kind of trust that’s necessary, perhaps sometimes, to help resolve the more difficult issues,” Thorson said.

SU began working with Kim Chaek University of Technology in 2002 to help build North Korea’s first digital library. This exchange centered on information technology and library resources, Thorson said.

But the relationship with Kim Chaek has hit a standstill, Carriere said. After the library was completed, SU made it clear that it wanted to have more meaningful, long-term exchanges, particularly in terms of study abroad programs. But no such program has been created. For now at least, Carriere said, the exchange between SU and Kim Chaek is no longer active.

North Korea is not interested in sending its students to the United States for extended stays, Carriere said. Students from North Korea have recently traveled to Vancouver, Canada and Australia for exchange programs, he said, but there are still no signs of having a similar exchange in the United States.

“The U.S. is still stalled because we don’t have diplomatic relations and because we are perceived by the North Koreans as their special enemy,” Carriere said. “We have a kind of special status as a hostile nation.”

More recently, in collaboration with the American Association for the Advancement of Science, CRDF Global and the Pacific Century Institute, SU has created the U.S.-DPRK Scientific Engagement Consortium, Carriere said.

This exchange, which was inspired by the exchange with Kim Chaek, has a broader scientific focus and works with North Korea’s State Academy of Sciences. Currently, SU is working with the State Academy of Sciences on two projects: creating a virtual library and developing a more advanced English language-training program, Carriere said.

The virtual library project will help scientists in North Korea have better access to scientific literature through the Internet, using digital copies. The virtual library will meet international standards for metadata, meaning the library will be able to share and access information from other libraries, Thorson said.

“It’s a long-term goal. But it’s one step at a time, or at least as many steps as we can take, anyway,” he said.

The English language is taught throughout the world, Carriere said, including North Korea. In the science field, English serves as the international language, meaning scientists in North Korea would require a more extensive English training program, which SU is helping the State Academy of Sciences to develop.

SU has a history of taking the first step. It was one of the first universities to welcome Japanese students after World War II and to work with the Soviet Union, Carriere said. A university may not be able to change public policy, but it can instill change through academics.

“We’re not in the business of trying to solve the food problem or delivering humanitarian aid, or something,” he said. “Our proper delivery is of academic exchanges of the kind of research and deep study that we associate with high-level university activities.”

Despite the United States’ contentious relationship with the communist country, the three students — Stilwell, Cheung and Hakim — feel it is important for people to see North Korea and its people for themselves.

Said Hakim: “We see these pictures or read the stories, we see the documentaries, and it’s one thing to see it through a medium, but once you get there you can analyze it for yourself.”

Published on September 19, 2012 at 3:00 am

Contact Casey: [email protected] | @caseyfabris