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Since his formative years in the Yakima Valley, David H. Shinn ’60 has traveled the world. After graduating from Â鶹ÊÓƵ, he went on to earn bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees from George Washington University (GWU) and launch a 37-year career in the . 

Following assignments at embassies in Lebanon, Kenya, Tanzania, Mauritania, Cameroon and Sudan, Shinn served as ambassador to Burkina Faso (1987 – 1990) and Ethiopia (1996 – 1999). Shinn received three State Department Superior Honor awards for his work, which included responding to famines, enhancing food security, peacekeeping efforts and initiating a public campaign against HIV/AIDS. 

In 2001, Shinn joined the faculty of , where he continues to teach courses on African affairs and China-Africa relations. He is author or coauthor of and, most recently,

YVC Voice recently connected with Shinn, 1994 Distinguished Alumnus of the Year, to discuss how growing up in the Yakima Valley contributed to his career in the Foreign Service, why the work of diplomats matters in people’s daily lives and the importance of having students from institutions like YVC pursue careers involving international work. 

How did your experience at YVC, whether your coursework or activities outside the classroom, help prepare you for success in your future studies? 

The transition in 1960 as a graduate from YVC to George Washington University in Washington, D.C. was not easy, but my coursework at YVC prepared me sufficiently well to obtain good grades at GWU. I had excellent YVC instruction, for example, in political science from Don Conner and in history from Robert McKinney and Roy Hoover.   

Serving as freshman class president and then in my sophomore year as president of the 10-member Washington State Junior College Student Government Association helped develop an appreciation for negotiating and the importance of teamwork. (Today, there are 34 community and technical colleges in the state.) As a member of the debate team, I honed argumentative skills that are critical in diplomacy. The cherry on the cake was being the recipient at the end of my sophomore year of the George Washington Foundation Scholarship to GWU.   

You’ve mentioned in other articles being perhaps the only student when you graduated from YVC to have an interest in a Foreign Service career.  Were there times in your career that you found your background growing up in the Yakima Valley provided a valuable perspective? 

Of course, I don’t know for a fact that I was the only student in Yakima that year with an interest in the Foreign Service, but I certainly was not aware of anyone, and few students had even heard of the Foreign Service in 1960. Having lived for the first 20 years of my life in Yakima, I was grounded. Many new Foreign Service officers during that era had moved around, often in big cities, before joining the Foreign Service. More recently new officers have experience living overseas. Both my wife, Judy, whom I met at YVC, and I had family in Yakima. We never felt rootless as is the case with many in the Foreign Service. Even now we return to Yakima every year or two and often walk through the YVC campus to see the changes.  

Working at the State Department in Washington, D.C. and at embassies overseas does not lend itself to maintaining a good understanding of how people think in the heartland. The nation’s capital is a political bubble. Regular trips back to Yakima helped establish a better understanding of changes taking place in America. Growing up in the Yakima Valley was also a reminder of the differences one encounters internationally and even in Washington, D.C.   

On the downside, returning to Yakima underscored how little interest there was in things international. But that, too, was a useful lesson and the situation has improved over time. I believe there has been, for example, a growing realization of the importance of foreign markets for the export of produce from the Yakima Valley. Much of the valley’s fruit and some of its wines are sold on the international market. For example, about one-third of Washington State’s cherry crop is exported to countries outside the United States although that percentage may drop significantly because of the tariff war.     

The Yakima Rotary Club has become active in support of in Ethiopia and other international activities. International exchange students are now routine visitors to the valley.  

TOP: David H. Shinn ’60 with his wife Judy on Vancouver Island in 2024. ABOVE: Shinn speaks at the 28th Harvard College China Forum in April 2025.

The countries where you served as ambassador, Ethiopia and Burkina Faso, can seem far away from people’s daily lives here in the Yakima Valley. What would you like people to know about why the work of diplomats matters and how it connects to their lives? 

The fact is that we are connected globally. I noted the connection between the Yakima Rotary Club and Project Mercy in Ethiopia. Although you may not find Yakima Valley produce in Ethiopia and Burkina Faso, you will find it in many other countries. At the macro level, the United States depends on support from around the world for its point of view in the UN General Assembly, where every country has one vote, and in a host of other international institutions such as the World Trade Organization. If you fail to cultivate the support of countries like Ethiopia and Burkina Faso, you lose out in these international organizations.  

We are witnessing today the dismantlement of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the American foreign aid agency, and the Voice of America (VOA), the official American radio and television outlet to the rest of the world. I appreciate that some Americans believe these activities are just a waste of taxpayer dollars. I respectfully disagree. Both organizations are important American soft power foreign policy tools. USAID not only helps struggling countries develop but it contributes to combatting international health threats overseas such as Ebola that can cause havoc in the United States. VOA tells America’s story in foreign lands in competition with a host of Chinese and Russian official media outlets that work hard to undermine U.S. policy and values. By dismantling these organizations, we ultimately hurt ourselves. Americans serving in USAID missions, until they recently shut down, and the offices of VOA and affiliated services such as Radio Free Europe implemented these programs.  

The State Department’s embassies and consulates in foreign countries provide routine consular services. If you are travelling overseas and you lose your passport, where do you go if there is no embassy or consulate in the country? Or worse, where do you seek help if you have an accident or are arrested? Embassy and consulate personnel support American businesses and promote trade. They collect political and economic information that feeds back to the State Department in Washington for the purpose of improving American foreign policy. These tasks can only be done effectively when you have personnel on the ground. 

What did you find meaningful about serving as a trustee of the Phi Theta Kappa Foundation and the role that Phi Theta Kappa serves at YVC and other institutions?  

During my sophomore year at YVC, I was invited to join (PTK). That led years later to being named Phi Theta Kappa’s Most Distinguished Alumnus for 1995. In 2007, I was asked to join the , a position I held for more than a decade. This involved raising funds for Phi Theta Kappa. It also allowed me to learn a great deal about the evolution of community colleges and to attend and to interact with students at the annual PTK convention. I was surprised by the number of community college students who were the first members of their family to attend college. I gained an appreciation for the different emphases that community colleges place on education. Some have an academic focus, some vocational and some adult education. Others do all three. But they all offer a two-year degree and a low-cost option to complete the first two years of a four-year degree, which was my reason for attending YVC.   

Phi Theta Kappa offers an enormous amount of guidance for all categories of community college students and a range of scholarships for those who are continuing with their education. It has courses on employment preparation, guidance on transferring to a four-year college, leadership development and improving research skills. The annual PTK convention is a lively and educational event where students can meet their peers from around the United States.   

What are a couple recommendations you’d offer to young people considering work involving international affairs? 

Learn a foreign language as early as possible in your educational career. Develop solid English-language writing skills. In the age of electronic social media, the ability to write clearly, succinctly and coherently is being lost. This becomes a serious handicap in most international affairs positions. Never stop reading and learning. A college diploma is not worth much if you treat it as the end of your education. Ideally, a diploma underscores why you need to continue learning until you take your last breath. This is especially important in the international field where change occurs every day. Finally, stay as active physically as you possibly can. Develop a sport or routine that you can pursue into your final years. Most positions in the international field require stamina, flexibility, and a healthy immune system. 

Why is it important to have students from an institution like Â鶹ÊÓƵ enter the Foreign Service or other careers involving international work? 

The national community college system tends to educate students who come from families with lower incomes and from many parts of the United States, including small towns and rural areas, that are not well represented in the U.S. Foreign Service. The Foreign Service needs this diversity to reflect all American values and backgrounds. In addition, the more community college graduates that eventually find their way into the Foreign Service and other international work underscores the importance of the connected world we live in to their family and friends back home. The United States cannot function successfully in isolation. We will all be better off if we understand how other nations depend on the United States and how the United States depends on them.

Story by Dustin Wunderlich, director of community relations. Photos courtesy of David and Judy Shinn.