>> My name is Elise Witnoski [phonetic],
and I work at the America Red Cross.
I do international policy and
external affairs for them.
So the American Red Cross is the
largest volunteer network in the world.
Every country has a Red Cross society.
We are at about 188 right now, including
newly-formed countries like South Sudan.
So each of those countries would
have its own national society.
Each of those Red Crosses look very different
depending on the capacity of that country
and the type of work that's needed
and that they're able to do there.
Then there's the Federation of the Red Cross and
Red Crescent, which is a membership organization
of all of the countries' Red Cross, and their
mandate is to respond to natural disasters.
And then there's the ICRC, the
International Committee of the Red Cross,
and their mandate is to respond
to wars and conflict.
While the ICRC in the time of conflict would be
there to provide aid to civilians, to monitor
and make sure that the civilian population,
that the laws of international
humanitarian law are not being broken
by either side, also to provide assistance.
They may provide ambulance
service, emergency medical care,
food, shelter to refugee populations.
The federation would do the same
in time of a natural disaster.
If there's a large hurricane or tsunami,
they would be there to help rebuild as well
as provide immediate needs
like food and shelter.
Another service that the Red Cross provides
which is really cool, and is a necessity
for people but is not as commonly thought of, is
they reconnect families when they are separated
in times of conflict or disaster.
Part of what I do is maintaining
our relationship
with other countries' Red Cross societies and
then the International Red Cross organizations,
the ICRC and the Federation of the Red Cross.
So I do policy briefs for our
leadership who will be attending meetings
with the International Red Cross or
other countries' Red Cross societies,
to help prepare them for what
that conversation might look like
and what our relationship
is with that organization.
So the team that I support is quite
large, so my days are usually very busy.
Getting in at nine, leave around nine or so.
And I would do a wide variety of functions.
I'm still relatively new into
my career as the spectrum goes.
So I do support a lot of
administrative work, arranging travel,
as well as some event planning, but I
also get to dive a little bit deeper
into some of the policy analysis.
So if there was a big meeting coming up, I would
take the papers that were provided to us prior
to that meeting and then summarize
them into short policy analysis
and give some recommendations on what the
American Red Cross' position should be
on any particular issue that the whole
Red Cross movement is considering.