PATRICK'S PEOPLE: Dean Cortes to share of time in Iraq

Finance is not generally regarded as one of the more hazardous professions, but it can be if the financial specialist is working to help citizens of a war-torn nation rebuild their shattered economy.

Dean Cortes, chairman of the Kelce College of Business economics, finance and banking department, Pittsburg State University, will discuss his experiences in Iraq at 2 p.m. today at the Miners Hall Museum, Franklin.

The free public program will be presented in conjunction with the current exhibit in the museum. Hosted by Edward D. Jones, its theme is “The Way We Worked in Southeast Kansas – Finance/Legal.”

Cortes was a participant in a project sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development to help Iraqi business schools rebuild and update their faculties and curriculum.

He said that he learned of the project from flyers received by Paul Grimes, new dean, and distributed to department chairmen to see if any PSU faculty members were interested. Cortes said that faculty members in his department, as well as others, showed no interest in going to Iraq, where there are still stories of frequent bombings and attacks.

Then he started thinking about going over himself.

“My wife, Paige, and I talked it over, and I thought it would be a nice way to give something back,” Cortes said. “Our children, Annie and Ben, were not very happy. They said no way, it’s not happening.”

Cortes got more information and communicated with others who had worked in Iraq. After his children learned how well he would be guarded, they were reconciled to the idea.

“For me, this was such a great opportunity that the safety issue got to be a secondary issue,” he said.

He arrived in Baghdad on June 4.Due to a glitch in communications, he spent four hours waiting in the airport before he was picked up by a South African security force and taken to Al Mansour compound which he said occupied several blocks in an upgrade Baghdad residential area.

“There were people working in seven different USAID projects housed there, working in different areas of reform, including agriculture, business, legal reform, political reform,” Cortes said. “I met a farmer from California who was teaching Iraqi farmers to grow grapes.”

He said the compound was like a small city, complete with a gourmet restaurant, housing, offices and a bar the residents called the Casbah.

“The South African security force was very well trained, very professional,” Cortes said. “They used code names like Zorro and Matrix and you could not take their photographs. But they were very nice guys, and were like my tour guides.”

He said it was his job to teach Iraqi  business professors how to be more effective, including introducing them to new teaching techniques, the use of instructional technology and updating curriculum. All of this is much needed.

“A lot of their facilities and classrooms are older, and it’s not easy to install things like computers and overhead projectors in them,” Cortes said. “During the wars in Iraq, many of their faculty members left or were killed.”

Classes there often last a full year rather than a semester, and may meet only once a week.

“Often the only assessment done on the students is a mid-term and then a final exam,” Cortes said. “The problem of student absences is rampant, because all they often have to do is come at the end of the year, take the final exam and pass it.”

Complicating the issue is the fact that any changes must be approved by the Ministry of Education, which controls Iraqi educational institutions.
The nation’s economic situation is also not good.

“Iraqi people are not very confident about their banking system,” Cortes said. “Many people prefer to keep their money at home, in bottles.The banks are very liquid and not leveraged at all. They may not give loans to anyone they don’t know so small businesses or those trying to get started may not be able to get loans. So where’s the economic development there? We need to get the banks to see that giving loans to small business can be a money-making thing for them. Right now, the Iraqi private sector is stagnating, and the banks are not helping at all.”

Cortes had been scheduled to give a lecture to a group of Iraqi bankers, but it didn’t happen.

“There were religious pilgrimages and our security force put the compound on lock-down,” Cortes said. “Nobody could leave the compound for about a week, and the lecture had to be canceled.”

He was able to do a five-day workshop with Iraqi professors, though he had to wear a Kevlar vest and be transported in a specially equipped security vehicle to get there.

He believes the workshop went well.

“They asked a lot of questions,” Cortes said. “It was very gratifying to meet with the Iraqi professors. You can tell they are thirsty for information.”

All in all, he said, it was a terrific experience, even if he did get awaked by explosions at 5 a.m. a few days before he went home.

In fact, he  believes he just might be invited back.

“They asked if my wife teaches ESOL (English as a Second Language) and I said that she does, so I think they might be working on a project for her,” Cortes said. “That would be a good thing because a lot of the professors I met did not have good English.”

He believes that there may be more interaction between PSU and Iraqi universities.

“It’s too early to send PSU professors over there, and certainly not students, but they could send Iraqi professors here,” Cortes said.