The International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP)

The IVLP brings participants each year to the United States from all over the world to meet and confer with professional counterparts and to experience the U.S. firsthand. It emphasizes increased mutual understanding through communication at the personal and professional levels. The VCWA's preferred hotel partner is the Green Mountain Suites in South Burlington, where the groups reside and have 2-3 professional appointments per day. On weekends we give them a taste of the many activities happening around the state. We also arrange for home hospitality (meals with Vermonters) when possible.

Groups vary in size from one visitor to 24. The visitors, current or potential leaders in government, politics, the media, education, and other fields, are selected by American officials overseas. Today one-fourth of the countries represented in the United Nations have an IVLP alumnus/alumna as their current Head of State. Almost 300 current and former Heads of State, more than 1,500 cabinet-level ministers, and many other distinguished world leaders in government and the private sector have participated in the IVLP, including:

• President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan (’87)
• President Anwar Sadat of Egypt (‘66)
• President Nicolas Sarkozy of France (’85)
• Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the United Kingdom (‘84/’92)
• Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of the United Kingdom (‘67)
• Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom (‘86/’92)

How it started

Today’s IVLP was founded in 1940 when Nelson Rockefeller, then Coordinator of Commercial and Cultural Affairs for the American Republics, first invited Latin American journalists to the U.S. Since then, the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act of 1961 (Fulbright-Hays Act) has funded the IVLP. Despite the increased difficulties since September 2001 in obtaining visas for some participants, the number of annual IVLP visitors increased slightly from approximately 4,500 in 1999 to just under 5,000 in 2007. Of these, about 130 come to Vermont each year. The program is identified by U.S. ambassadors as the most effective public diplomacy tool at their command and enjoys bi-partisan support in the U.S. Congress.

The IVLP and Vermont

The VCWA promotes Vermont as a center for agriculture, commerce, culture, education and tourism in Northern New England as well as a locus of innovative thinking on the environment, green jobs, social programs, accountable governance and a host of other topics. We also host groups on border security issues. We also compile a community impact each statement each year. In 2008, for example, the IVLP contributed almost $500,000 to the Vermont economy (hotels, transportation, meals, labor, incidentals and shopping).