IGCC People

Use the links below to find more information on IGCC faculty, staff, steering committee members, and campus program directors.

IGCC Staff

Russell A. Burgos
Middle East Program Director, Military-Security

Russell Burgos is responsible for the IGCC Middle East Military Dialogue Program. Burgos received his Ph.D. in political science from UCLA in 2005 and was a visiting professor at Claremont McKenna College from 2005 to 2007. He currently teaches at UCLA. In addition to his academic training, Burgos served in the Army and Army Reserve for eighteen years, as both an enlisted soldier and an officer, in communications, civil affairs, and psychological operations.

Lynne Bush
Senior Editor

Lynne Bush develops and implements IGCC print and electronic publications strategies, programs, and projects. She is the editor of the IGCC newsletters, IGCC Policy Papers, IGCC Policy Briefs, and IGCC books, for which she solicits and develops manuscripts from international faculty, researchers and project participants, and directs production and distribution. She is also the primary writer and content manager for the IGCC web site. Prior to coming to IGCC in 2002, Bush was managing editor of the political science journal International Organization. She received her M.F.A. in creative writing from San Diego State University in 2006.

Tai Ming Cheung
Research Coordinator

Tai Ming Cheung is a research fellow and research coordinator at IGCC. His responsibilities include managing the institute's track two program the Northeast Asia Cooperation Dialogue (NEACD), which brings together senior foreign ministry and defense officials as well as academics from the United States, China, Japan, South Korea, North Korea, and Russia for informed discussions on regional security issues. He also teaches at the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies (IR/PS) at UCSD.

Cheung is a long-time analyst of Chinese defense and national security affairs. He was based in Asia from the mid-1980s to 2002 covering political, economic and strategic developments in greater China. He was also a journalist and political and business risk consultant in northeast Asia. He received his Ph.D. from the War Studies Department at King's College, London University in 2006.

Raymond A. Clark
PPBT Project Manager

Raymond Clark is program manager for IGCC's "Public Policy and Biological Threats" (PPBT) program. Clark joined IGCC in early 2005 after serving as a policy analyst with the UCSD Office of Government and Community Relations. He has a Ph.D. in cardiovascular physiology and previously worked as a research associate in molecular cardiology in the UCSD School of Medicine. In addition to managing and expanding the PPBT program, Clark is involved in developing several IGCC programs in homeland security, national security and public health security. He is also a founding board member of the National Postdoctoral Association and has been influential in formulating policy for the scientific workforce in the United States.

Andrea R. Hill
Director of Special Projects, Middle East Program

Heidi Knuff
Conference and Events Coordinator

Heidi Knuff joined the IGCC team in Fall 2006. She works closely with IGCC program managers to plan and manage all of IGCC’s domestic and international conferences as well as various other events for the institute. Prior to joining IGCC, Knuff was program coordinator for the Program on Emerging Technologies at MIT and also organized events for the MIT Center for International Studies. Knuff has held previous positions at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice, the University of San Diego Office of Parent Relations, and Pacific Intercultural Exchange, where she supervised the counseling and placement of high school foreign exchange students throughout the United States. She holds a B.A. in communication studies from the University of San Diego.

Elisa Lurkis
Grants Development Analyst

Prior to joining IGCC, Lurkis worked in development and proposal writing for the University of New Mexico, High Tech High, and the San Diego Museum of Man. She holds a B.A. in literature from UC Santa Cruz and an M.A. in rhetoric and writing from San Diego State University.

Joseph R. McGhee
Washington Representative

Joseph R. McGhee is a former foreign service officer with over twenty years of experience in international affairs. As IGCC's Washington representative, McGhee works to increase IGCC's profile within the policy community and serves as IGCC's liaison in Washington, D.C. He designs, implements, and manages IGCC outreach activities, programs, and fundraising initiatives in Washington, D.C. for the U.S. Congress, government agencies, nongovernmental and other organizations, academic institutions, and other foreign policy-related organizations.

Helen Olow
Business Officer

Helen Olow joined the IGCC team in July 2002. She is currently the institute's chief financial and administrative officer, responsible for all the business operations of the unit including long and short-term planning and overall management. Olow works closely with the IGCC director in developing, planning, and coordinating programs, and linking research and teaching agendas on all nine campuses and the two UC-managed laboratories to the institute's mission. Olow has been on the staff at UC San Diego since 1986. Prior to coming to IGCC, she worked as the financial officer for four divisions and one science center at Scripps Institute of Oceanography.

Stella Post
Campus Programs Coordinator

Stella Post coordinates IGCC campus programs and supports IGCC system-wide activities. She currently serves as the administrator for the "Public Policy and Nuclear Threats" (PPNT) program, an NSF-funded program which trains natural and social scientists from several University of California campuses to be strategic thinkers on nuclear weapons issues. Post is the IGCC liaison between the IGCC central office and the members of the IGCC Steering Committee and Campus Program Directors. Additionally, she manages all of IGCC's annual grant and fellowship competitions.

Post holds a B.A. in history from the University of Colorado, and is pursuing an M.A. in communication and language (part-time). Prior to UCSD, she worked as a project analyst for the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Project Management in Colorado.

Bari Weick
Fiscal Manager

Bari Weick is responsible for the overall management and supervision of the fiscal activities of IGCC, including contracts and grants, administration of awards, accounting activities, personnel and payroll, equipment management, and computing. In addition, he is responsible for budget and financial oversight for IGCC grant-related awards and provisions on the UC campuses.

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