Storm P. Jackson, Operations Officer, Bureau of Verification, Compliance and Implementation
Storm P. Jackson was sworn in as a Foreign Service Officer in October 2002 by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell.
 | Mr. Jackson recently returned to Washington DC and is an Operations Officer in the Nuclear Risk Reduction center in the Bureau of Verification, Compliance and Implementation of the Department of State. |
From 2002 to 2004 Storm was assigned to the U.S. Consulate General in Lagos, Nigeria. For his first year he served as a Consular Officer and interviewed Nigerians wishing to visit the U.S. for business or pleasure as well as those immigrating to be reunited with family members who are American Citizens. In his second year he was the Information Officer and the primary contact for international and local media. In addition, he had the pleasure of coordinating the dissemination of information about Mission activities and articulating U.S. Foreign Policy to the public.
Before leaving for Nigeria Mr. Jackson worked in the Office of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in the Bureau of African affairs on a planning team for the Presidential Visit to Africa and an AGOA conference.
As a Thomas Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellow Storm served in the Office of Caribbean Affairs in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs in Washington working primarily on the confirmation of Ambassadors and OAS issues. Overseas, he interned in the U.S. Embassy in Windhoek, Namibia as the Ambassador's Staff Assistant and Political Officer reporting on events leading up to elections. He also spent time as a development consultant in Kampala, Uganda working with a local HIV/AIDS NGO on needs assessment, resource identification and capacity building for traditional healers.
Storm did his graduate work in International Affairs at Columbia University's School for International and Public Affairs in New York City. He also has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Psychology and a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Philosophy from Howard University in Washington, DC.
Mr. Jackson was born in New York but has West Indian roots having grown up in Guyana. He now lives in Alexandria, Virginia with his wife and their two cats.
QUESTION: Please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your experience to date as a Foreign Service Officer.
MR. JACKSON: My name is Storm Jackson and I'm a Foreign Service officer with the State Department. I am coned as a public diplomacy officer, so my responsibilities are mostly with dealing with the press and with cultural issues overseas. I was most recently stationed in Lagos, Nigeria and I was there for two years from 2003 to 2005. VIDEO
QUESTION: Where are you from originally?
MR. JACKSON: I'm actually from New York. I was born in New York, but my family returned to Guyana in South America, so I grew up in Guyana, came back to the U.S. for school, for university. So a large part of my life was spent in the Caribbean, hence the kind of Caribbean accent, but it's a bit muddled in with an American accent now as well. VIDEO
QUESTION: What's were some of your most meaningful experiences during your time in Nigeria?
MR. JACKSON: My time in Nigeria -- one of my most vivid memories of the country was the simple magnitude of it. Nigeria is very large. It's about 130 million people and it's very vibrant. The people, the cultures, the languages, everyone is always active and there's always a sense of excitement in the air and vibrance to the city Lagos, especially.
In particular, there are a number of different cases that I have that were interesting and getting the opportunity to speak to the press and to give the message of the Embassy of activities that we would be doing and then seeing it in the newspapers the following day and having folks come to those events; that, for me, was very meaningful as well. VIDEO
QUESTION: Do you have an anecdote that was particularly important in Nigeria but probably didn't make the papers back home?
MR. JACKSON: I think one of the most interesting things that happened to me in Nigeria was a case involving some American children who were discovered, for want of a better word, abandoned in Nigeria. There was seven children who were adopted by a Nigerian American family in the U.S. but then taken to Nigeria to live there with some relatives; however, those relatives were unable to care properly for the children and the Embassy was able to intervene on their behalf and return them to the U.S. The whole process took a few days to get done, from finding the children to getting out to a remote location, picking them up, bringing them back in, and then putting them on a plane back to the U.S. And that kind of symbolizes what it is we do as Foreign Service officers; we are there to always help any American in need and that's our primary focus overseas. VIDEO
QUESTION: What was sort of the most moving things you observed in Nigeria?
MR. JACKSON: I would have to say that one of the most moving things for me during my tour in Nigeria was the visa line, as Foreign Service officers call it. I mean, this is the place where most officers will interact with the majority of the public and many of these people, these are the only Americans that they actually see and meet in person. For me, that was very meaningful. We would have mamas, as you call them, coming from the villages traveling for two days to get to the Consulate to interview with us because they want to go and visit their sons or daughters in the U.S. That level of interaction and that kind of being able to move what an American is from off the TV screen into a real-life person and say, "Hi, good morning, my name is Storm, how can I help you," that, to me, was very significant. VIDEO
QUESTION: Do you feel that you changed anyone's life while you were serving in Nigeria?
MR. JACKSON: I think that I did make a difference in doing my job. I think that once you apply the correct professionalism, courtesy, respect to my job, that it makes a difference to people because, as I said before, if someone -- if I'm the only American that they meet and I leave a sour taste in their mouth, then I have not done my job correctly. And I think that on some small levels, you know, they might say, oh, I remember that one big black American guy who was here with the dreadlocks, and that to me is special. VIDEO
QUESTION: What would you say to the American public about your experience in Nigeria and your experience as a Foreign Service officer in general?
MR. JACKSON: As a Foreign Service officer and to speak a bit about my experience in Nigeria, what it means to me, what being a Foreign Service officer means to me, simply is -- it's very rewarding personally and professionally. I have a job that very few people have. I have the ability to travel all over the world to represent America, to be the face of America to the world overseas. And that for me is very special, very important. The opportunities that I've had so far in the Department are numerous and personally fulfilling, and as a career I can't see myself doing anything else. VIDEO
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