2012 Peace Islands Institute Massachusetts Annual Friendship and Awards Dinner

Peace Islands Institute Massachusetts organized the Annual Friendship and Awards Dinner on Tuesday November 13, 2012 at Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel. The event started with a reception where attendees had chance to interact with each other. The dinner’s emcee was Todd Newton, "America's Life Coach" and Emmy Award winner TV presenter. The guests viewed a video prepared by Todd Newton after being seated in the Atlantic Ballroom. The video covered Todd Newton’s work as a spokesman for Soles4Souls, an international organization that collects and distributes shoes to the needy. In the video, Todd visits Haiti and asks viewers to help give hope to the Haitians through their contribution. The video was followed by Todd Newton’s welcome speech as the host of the event. Newton introduced Daron Acemoglu, the keynote speaker of the event, the Elizabeth and James Killian Professor of Economics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Professor Acemoglu’s keynote address had the same title as his recent book “Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty”. In his speech, Acemoglu argued that the nations with inclusive political and economic institutions are more likely to succeed as opposed to the geography hypothesis. 

The guests enjoyed the dinner and conversations at their tables after the keynote speech. The program resumed by a welcome speech of Dr. Birol Ozturk, Executive Director of Peace Islands Institute Massachusetts branch who left the audience with a short video about PII. Next, Mehmet Kalyoncu gave a talk on “Peace building through education”. Mr. Kalyoncu is an independent political analyst and frequent contributor to the English-language daily, Today's Zaman. In his talk, he stated that the education alone is not a solution to the problems of today’s world. He gave examples of Hitler, Stalin and other dictators and pointed out that these people were not less educated yet they committed worst crimes of humanity. He stressed the importance of moral education and informed the audience about Fethullah Gulen, honorary president of PII and his educational philosophy. 

The event continued with the award ceremony. Todd Newton invited Mr. Michael Jackman, Congressman Bill Keating’s district director to receive the 2012 PII Legislative Award on behalf of Congressman Keating, representing Massachusetts’ 10th Congressional District. Mr. Jackman also shared an award acceptance letter of Congressman Keating with the audience. The Award was presented by Burhan Kaya, director of Global Affairs Center at PII-MA. The 2012 PII Global Education Award was presented to Sherman Teichman, the inaugural Executive Director of the Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University. After a slide show about IGL, Sherman Teichman told the story of the blue UN helmet, he was wearing in one of the slide pictures in award acceptance speech. The helmet was a gift to Teichman from one of the former IGL students. 2012 PII Media Award was presented to Michael Rich, MD. Dr. Rich is an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health and the Director of the Center on Media and Child Health (www.cmch.tv) at Boston Children’s Hospital. Following a short video about the CMCH, Dr. Rich took the stage to receive the award and to deliver his acceptance speech. A special recognition award was presented Victoria Arlen, Gold medal winner in swimming in 2012 London Paralympics. The audience viewed a short video of Arlen’s winning race and her interview after receiving the Gold medal before she took the stage. The audience experienced emotional moments during Arlen’s acceptance speech. Todd Newton concluded the program and thanked the guests for their attendance.