From Florida to Cambridge: A USF Future Strategist Experience at Cambridge

In this “At the Boundary” podcast, GNSI Academic Director David Oakley, PhD, spoke with two students from the University of South Florida selected to attend the 2025 ISI Programme: May Birch and Kyle Rudd.

Throughout the episode, Birch and Rudd, who are both members of USF’s Future Strategist Program, share their experiences over the summer. They discuss exclusive networking opportunities and insight into intelligence and security careers unknown to them beforehand. The students also noted the wealth of first hand experiences shared by distinguished experts from around the globe. Not to mention the scenic Cambridge University campus and surrounding landscape.

The five week trip is part of a partnership between GNSI and The International Security and Intelligence Programme presented by the Cambridge Security Initiative & The Department of War Studies. GNSI is determined to support this and other student initiatives to better prepare the next generation of security practitioners. 

For more information about The International Security and Intelligence Programme at Cambridge University, please check their website in the links below.

Links from the episode:

• Cyber Beacon 2025 registration here!

• Register for the Florida Security Forum: Port and Maritime Security

• More information about The International Security and Intelligence Programme at Cambridge University

At the Boundary from the Global and National Security Institute at the University of South Florida, features global and national security issues we’ve found to be insightful, intriguing, fascinating, maybe controversial, but overall just worth talking about.

A "boundary" is a place, either literal or figurative, where two forces exist in close proximity to each other. Sometimes that boundary is in a state of harmony. More often than not, that boundary has a bit of chaos baked in. The Global and National Security Institute will live on the boundary of security policy and technology and that's where this podcast will focus.

The mission of GNSI is to provide actionable solutions to 21st-century security challenges for decision-makers at the local, state, national and global levels. We hope you enjoy At the Boundary.

Look for our other publications and products on our website publications page.

Transcript

Jim Cardoso: 0:12

Jim, hello everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of at the boundary, the podcast from the global and national security Institute at the University of South Florida. I'm Jim Cardoso, Senior Director for GNSI, and your host for at the boundary. Today on the show, we're going to talk with two USF students on the exciting and unique way they pass their summer. May Burch and Kyle Rudd spent five weeks in the UK studying with some of the world's leading experts in national security and intelligence at the renowned international security and intelligence program at Cambridge University. More from them in a moment. First, a reminder that cyber beacon conference is scheduled for October 16. Here at USF, registration has gone great so far, and we're excited to partner on this flagship National Defense University event for its first foray outside the immediate National Capital Region. That being said. NDU is one of the many federal government organizations impacted by the shutdown. Depending on how long it takes the government to reopen, it may drive a relook at that October 16 date. Remember, though that registration is free, so keep doing so and telling your friends to do so, even as the shutdown injects uncertainty, we're excited to highlight just a few of the scheduled speakers for the event. GNSI Executive Director, retired Marine Corps General Frank McKenzie, NDU President, Vice Admiral Peter Garvin, principal cyber Advisor to the Secretary of the Army, Brandon Pugh, and former NDU president, retired Air Force Lieutenant General Michael plane. Keep an eye on our social media and website for updates on the status of the conference. Okay, time to bring in our featured guests today, May Burch and Kyle Rudd, two USF students and members of GNSI future strategist program, along with Dr Dave Oakley, GNSI Academic Director, Dave helped forge a partnership between GNSI and the international security and intelligence program, one of The world's leading education programs for future and current practitioners and part of the Cambridge University security initiative, our partnership with isI allows our team to send up to four students to Cambridge each year to attend the program. May and Kyle were chosen this year as the first two students to attend. They spent five weeks in the UK this summer, and are here today to talk with Dave about their experience.

Dave Oakley: 2:47

Welcome May and Kyle, it's great to have

Unknown: 2:49

you. Thank you for having us. Thanks for having us. Hey, you know,

Dave Oakley: 2:53

to get started, we'd like you to first tell, tell us a little bit, or tell the listeners a little bit about yourself. Begin with you may.

May Burch: 3:00

Hi, guys, I'm May. So I'm an International Studies major with a minor in Legal Studies. This is my third year at USF. I am graduating in the spring, and I'm kind of concentrated on China US relations, which is what I studied a bit more about in Cambridge, and then eventually I hope to go to law school and do international law.

Unknown: 3:24

Hey, thanks, May. How about you, Kyle, sure. I am also a junior here at USF. I will be graduating in fall of 2027 so I'll be taking up all four years, not as quick as May, but I am studying international relations in econ, and I have a minor in intelligence studies.

Dave Oakley: 3:38

Hey, don't worry, it took me four and a half years. Hey, you know, first you were our two inaugural students attending the Cambridge security initiatives international security intelligence program. What motivated for you to apply

Unknown: 3:52

sure I could start off. I have always been interested in intelligence, so I added my minor in intelligence last year, when I was starting to get into the open source work at one of my internships. Fell in love with that kind of work and wanted to learn more about it. I also added econ around the same time. So I was looking to merge the two econ and intelligence work together, and I really wanted to work on a research project, just to learn as much as I could about that field. When I was over, you know, on a research study program or whatever, through FSP, I saw this program come up in Cambridge. I was already in England at the time. Actually fell in love with the two countries, loved their relationship together, and wanted to learn more about that. So that's what really encouraged me. It was the UK based experience that I could tie in with the US intel that was something that really

Dave Oakley: 4:34

interested me. You mentioned your research project. Can you go in a little more detail explain what you focused your research on while you're over there? Yeah. So I was

Unknown: 4:40

looking a little bit into cybersecurity stuff. So I was focusing on how the US and the UK can collaborate best to combat any sort of cyber crimes that would impact our infrastructure. So power grids, electric vehicle charging, gas stations, anything that's infrastructure related, I wanted to figure out how we could prevent that from happening in the future. Be. Because that is the backbone of the world economy. So that's, that's what my research was in.

Dave Oakley: 5:05

Hey, thanks, Kyle. Hey, May. What motivated you? So I

May Burch: 5:08

was always kind of interested in national security. The reason I came to USF, actually, was because I used to attend the GNSI conferences my senior year with my dad, and my dad's in the field. So it always got me really interested in the field. So when I was studying, I knew I was interested in national security, but I wasn't necessarily sure what in national security. So I ended up joining FSP. When it started, I became their inaugural president, and I started to kind of gear my interest towards specifically East Asia, mostly because I've been learning Mandarin, and it was kind of naturally fell into place. So when I saw that there was an opportunity to go to Cambridge and study and research, I decided to take that opportunity to further my own research in the field, but also to go to the UK, because I'd never been there and see kind of a new country and a new experience at a new institution.

Dave Oakley: 5:59

So you mentioned a research project. What did you focus your research on?

May Burch: 6:03

So my research was how the intelligence community in the US kind of played off of the administration each year towards their China policy. So within the last five years, there's been a complete shift in how we view China, and a lot of that is because of the annual threat assessments that are put out every year by the intelligence community, which are then reflected in the national security strategy that's put out by the administration each year. So I kind of looked at that, and then I also had looked at the Pacific deterrence index to look at how our funding in the area has increased, because that's a monetary way to say how we've changed our intentions in the area.

Dave Oakley: 6:49

It sounds like both. You had an interesting research experience over there. You know, thinking about your broader experience. You know, us back here, sat every week and waited for your student blog from Cambridge. You know, with anticipation. Can you tell us a little bit about your experience in Cambridge? For those who read the blog and maybe those who didn't have the opportunity,

May Burch: 7:10

Cambridge was wonderful. I mean, when I first stepped in Cambridge, I felt like I was on the scene of a Harry Potter movie, which kind of makes sense, because I did film some of the movies there. It was very vibrant. I will say there were people from, I feel like so many different countries, just coming to check Cambridge out and look at these, you know, historic sites, as for the institution that we were at in the classes that we took, it was unbelievably intense at times, but enjoyable. I must say, they they brought a lot of professionals from fields that I don't think I would have ever had the opportunity to talk to on a regular basis. Um, and I learned things about other parts of the world that I don't think I would have ever learned just staying here at USF. Because unfortunately, that information is not always available unless you're hearing it directly from the mouth of someone that lives there. So I think it was honestly kind of a life changing experience, because I think it really makes you broaden your horizons. And you know, with such a because there was about 80 of us in our cohort, and we all came from different countries, different careers. And when I had first gone there, I'd anticipated that everyone would be an undergrad, just like me and Kyle, but they were all, almost all of them were professionals in the career, actually doing things in the world now, which is really interesting, because you got to see like this different lens of intelligence and security from like, a career standpoint, and not just a educational standpoint, as I had seen it in so, yeah, I would say it's definitely career changing and life changing. You quite

Dave Oakley: 8:52

enjoyed it. I'm gonna throw a question at you. This will I'm gonna ask Kyle the same question, so you'll have a little chance to think about it. But if you had to name maybe one or two of the best experiences that you had in Cambridge, be it a speaker, an event, or something that you experienced. What would you name?

May Burch: 9:11

I would say the first one would be there was an officer that came from Pakistan, and I really, really enjoyed his speech, just because, I think he gave us a difference of opinion that As Americans, we would never consider he had worked for Sis, I believe, which is the Pakistani intelligence, like it's their CIA, and he was a pretty high up officer. He was telling us about his own experience, and I thought it was very interesting, because I just there was information in there that you just can't get from, like reading a book or taking a class. So that was probably my top most enjoyable experience, because it gave me a very different perspective. And then I. Another experience I quite enjoyed was we had a conference. So there's a conference at Cambridge, I said, about a two day conference. And some of those panels that we had with the speakers were very interesting. They made you think about things in a completely different light. And we had some very like enthusiastic speakers. So I think that was also very informational. And I enjoyed seeing like, the difference in opinions between like the panel members, which I think they did a really good job of bringing in people with two different sides of the same coin.

Dave Oakley: 10:35

So yeah, I've been to the this was my second year at that event, and I I'm always impressed with how the conveners, Mike, Dave and others are able to bring different, differing views on the same panel and have a productive dialog. So yeah, I agree with you. So turning over to you, Kyle, how was your experience in Cambridge, and what were the highlights for you?

Unknown: 10:58

Yeah. So one of the best months of my entire life. I met interesting people from every walk of life. I made great friends from Qatar. I made great friends who had just gotten out of the military. I had friends who were deep into academia, and I had friends who were, you know, in the middle of their careers, working at companies we all know, doing interesting stuff. My all time. Favorite part of that entire program was the Doug wise in Richard kerbage is how you say it, think it, think it's how you say his last name. They gave a book speak. It was incredible. I actually, just the other day, was talking to one of my one of my professors, after class, and he recommended me a book that he that he had in the class, and handed it to me, and I'm flipping through the pages, and I'm like, this. Something about this feels familiar. It was actually Richard's book that he was promoting while we were at Cambridge. So just kind of a small world of intelligence was interesting. Something I really noticed. The book's called the defector. I haven't read that one yet, but I did read his The Secret History of the Five Eyes book, which was very interesting. I audio booked it. Interesting guy, and when Doug wise was speaking, who was the chief of mission for a bunch of different countries, I think Iraq and Afghanistan, he was, you know, at the forefront of the intelligence war, I guess you could say at that time. So hearing from him, just an incredibly passionate speaker, incredibly accessible. I've messaged him on LinkedIn several times. He's gotten back to me. Yeah. Gotten back to me, so I'd say Richard cabbage and Doug wise. Incredible people, incredible experience. And then, of course, the conference two days of listening to people who know everything there is to know about this world, interesting stuff. Learned about career paths in intelligence that I didn't even know existed before this. So they had a guy from Google there who was talking about, you know, the quantum computing that they do at Google and all the security systems behind that, and what's going to happen when, you know, we can crack the encryptions in 20 minutes that we have built our entire security systems on. So just hearing about all the different opportunities, all the different career paths, and all the different people that come together to make the intelligence community work was really interesting

Dave Oakley: 13:04

to me. No, I'm, you know, good friends with with Doug and Richard. And you're right. There are fantastic folks. In fact, Doug's one of our non resident distinguished fellows, and curvages new book, The defector. We're hoping to do a book talk with him. So because it just came out in the UK, you know, now that you guys have experienced this, it sounds like it was a great experience, very enriching. I was hoping you could tell us a little bit about what you're currently doing on campus and what are your goals moving forward, both academically and professionally and personally. And we'll begin with with you this time.

Unknown: 13:39

Kyle, sure, yeah. So when I got back, I was looking for a campus job, actually, and I worked now with USF world, helping other students go abroad, either for Fulbright programs, for research projects, for Peace Corps, anything is I had such a great experience, I want to give you know. I want to promote that to other students so they have the opportunity to have the same experiences that I had. So campus job, working at USF world, working on promoting all of their exchange programs, is something I'm very passionate about. Staying involved with FSP, looking forward to our meeting coming up sometime in the next couple of weeks there, and our book and movie night thing tonight. I'm looking forward to so staying involved at that. And then one other thing I've gotten pretty heavily involved in is the iccae scholars program it is. They actually promoted it with my minor in intelligence. Is this group of students who come together who work on a series of projects that relate to Intel. So I worked on one a little bit ago, which was they gave us access to the unclassified satellite images from China, and we were actually able to compile a report on it, analyzing the economy of China. So my group, we were working on trying to figure out where China's working to invest in. So we would use these images of what we focused on was the ports. And we were able to see, hey, look, there's, you know, 500 container ships coming in and out of here each month. Something's going on here, because this is a port that you know, that they haven't been for. Focusing on so we saw that there was a bunch of activity going on there. We were able to write a report saying, This is what we think is going on here, and we'll see in the future if it comes true. And the exciting part about that was they gave us so much freedom. They gave us the question and told us to write a report. They gave us no other instructions. So my great team of all FSP people, actually we worked and uploaded these images into an AI model that we built. So we taught the AI model to basically, like, look at the amount of ships, count them and give us a graph. So instead of looking through these 10,000 images across five years or whatever the timeframe was, we were able to mass upload this file, send it off to the AI model, let it run for a couple hours, whatever had to do, and then it would come back and give us an accurate port, showing us the increase in shipping into this region. At that time, we submitted it to the DNI, which is the organization that funds the iccie scholarships, and a couple of their senior members wrote back to us, impressed with the impressed with the GPT model that we built, and just interested to learn more. So that was something that happening on campus right now. Every student can get involved in is just interesting experience and interesting connections.

Dave Oakley: 16:10

Hey, thanks. Colin May, how about you? What are your things you work on now, your future goals? Professionally, personally, academically.

May Burch: 16:17

So as I mentioned before, I'm still involved with FSP, except instead of President, I'm now event coordinator. Definitely an interesting switch. I've personally enjoyed it. Another thing is, I do have my campus jobs. Unfortunately, none of them are quite related to intelligence. I do. I do work my fill, and then for some of like the more intelligence focused right now I'm a mark war fellow, so I sit on the Tampa Bay Committee on Foreign Relations. I get to hear from these speakers, very distinguished people. And they talk about their careers. They talk about, you know, what they've done with their life. And it's very interesting. The last one that I went to, there was a gentleman talking about his work in Africa, because he was an ambassador there. Very interesting. I really enjoyed that talk. And you also get to sit with the even the people in the audience are all very extraordinary people who did a lot with their lives. So that was a very interesting one. I also just applied for my Fulbright. I know that Kyle had mentioned that, but I just applied for my Fulbright to Taiwan. So that was something that took up a majority of my last month or so, and hopefully, if I am able to get that, it will give me more of an in person view of East Asia and East Asian relations. Thanks.

Dave Oakley: 17:36

May you know, I want to give you both an opportunity for some final thoughts. But as part of those final thoughts, I want you to give some thoughts on other people applying for the international security intelligence program. And so applications for the 2026 year are going to open up roughly around the November timeframe. And so what would you say to the student who is looking at that opportunity and trying to think of other opportunities and decide whether or not to apply for it.

May Burch: 18:04

I would say to anyone interested in applying, just do it. You know, I didn't think that I was going to get it, and I still applied. And I was like, you know, I'll just throw my hat in the ring and I'll see. And I got it, and I had an incredible experience, and I would do it all over again if I could. So I will say, Just do it. Don't feel like you have to know a lot about intelligence and security to go out there. This is supposed to be a learning opportunity for a lot of people. So, you know, maybe you're slightly interested in the field, or maybe you have a very niche topic you want to research, and you you know, you don't feel qualified. This is meant to be one of those like things that qualify you for future experiences. So to any student that is interested in applying, I really do say Apply. And then to anyone that does get this opportunity, and does go to Cambridge, make the most of that month, really just do like, don't, don't sit around, just do whatever you can. You know, talk to your peers, walk around Cambridge, go to London, do something. I know that there's so much to do in the UK. I mean, you have a whole month there and a bunch of resources around you, so make sure to make the most of the month that you're there

Dave Oakley: 19:13

before we move over to Kyle. I gotta have one really serious question, Did either of you go punting? Kids? I did not, you did not go pun,

Unknown: 19:22

no, I was very sick that one day.

May Burch: 19:24

No, I love punting. Oh my gosh, yes, if you go to Cambridge, please go punting. It is one of the most fun experiences. It basically is. It's boats on the river. They take you down this I ideally it's idyllic, idyllic river. And they, they show you a lot of the sites from this river, and it's just beautiful. There's ducks that come up to you, and there's this punting boat that sells alcohol with a dog. It's just like, it's an experience. It's, I feel like an authentic Cambridge experience. So please do go. Do that if you go to Cambridge, that was, like, one of my favorite things there.

Dave Oakley: 20:04

Thanks, man. Kyle, your final thoughts, what you would recommend to a student who's considering applying for the program,

Unknown: 20:10

so I'm gonna absolutely agree with everything they said. You don't have to be an expert in intelligence going in. We're students, and they know that the one thing I can recommend to you is this will be the best networking experience you could possibly have if you want to work in intelligence. The amount of people they have in one area that are all interested in the exact same thing as you is something I don't think is going to be replicated for a long time in your career. So network like crazy, because the people there are going to be working with you in this field for your career, it's people you're gonna know forever. I think that one of my highlights was the networking. Like, completely agree that networking is the greatest thing that could not have came out of this trip. So one of my closest friends on this trip was part of a think tank as one of their collegiate members. So I was actually able to join this network based on her reference, she referred me to them, got in contact a little bit, and got to know a lot of the guys at the think tank. This is AEI, the American Enterprise Institute. And as a collegiate member, you are able to attend all of their conferences. I they flying me out to Philly next month to attend a conference on religion and national security. So the networking opportunities there are incredible. And I don't just mean with other students, the professors there are there to help you as well. So of course, any of the speakers, you can message them on LinkedIn. A lot of us, a lot of them gave us our emails. I've reached out to several of them since then. Doug wise, I mentioned earlier, just a great networking experience. Make the most of it and explore what the UK has to offer over there, 100% go explore London for a day. Go to the Winston Churchill war rooms. Go to Bexley Park. Go explore everything that you possibly can in the month that you get over there.

Dave Oakley: 21:55

Hey, thanks, Kyle. Hey, May. Kyle, this has been a tremendous opportunity to sit down chat with you, very impressed of what you've achieved already and looking forward to what you guys achieve in the future. So glad that you're part of GNSI, glad that you're part of FSP and thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Jim Cardoso: 22:16

Special. Thanks to Dr Dave Oakley, GNSI Academic Director, along with USF students and GNSI Future strategist Program members, may Burch and Kyle Rudd, the first two students chosen to attend a prestigious international security and intelligence program under the Cambridge University Security Initiative, we plan to send students to isI every summer, and welcome your financial support To help make that happen, go to our website or contact us to see ways you can contribute for students. Applications for 2026 will open before you know it. So start building your resume. Next week, on the podcast, we'll be talking with three co authors of an article on drone threats to stadiums and public venues from the latest issue of GNSI is Journal of strategic security. We've talked about drones and autonomous warfare previously on at the boundary, but this article dives into a direct threat to infrastructure and the civilian population. Dr John Sullivan, Nathan Jones and George Davis Jr will join us next week if you don't want to miss that episode or any of our future episodes, be sure to subscribe. Wherever you get your podcasts, we're on Apple podcasts, Spotify and even YouTube. Give us a like and subscribe and click that alert Bell while you're there. Thanks for listening today. Follow along with GNSI on our LinkedIn and X accounts at USF. Underscore GNSI And check out our website as well, at usf.edu/gnsi, while you're there, don't forget to subscribe to our monthly newsletter that's going to wrap up this episode of at the boundary. Each new episode will feature global and national security issues we found to be insightful, intriguing, maybe controversial, but overall, just we're talking about, I'm Jim Cardoso, and we'll see you at the boundary. You.