Your passport to global affairs

January 12, 2026: Mona Yacoubian, Senior Advisor and Director, Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and international Studies. "The Middle East at a Hinge Moment"

January 26, 2026: Daniel Alpert and panelists from The International Club of Business Economics: “Impacting the Global Economy” (one session at 4:30 pm, followed by social mixer with panelists for President's Club members; details to be announced)

February 9, 2026: Michael E. O’Hanlon, Brookings Institution, “To Dare Mighty Things: U.S. Defense Strategies Since the Revolution, and Lessons for Today”. 

February 23, 2026: Tim Ditter, Senior Research Scientist, U.S. Center for Naval Analyses. “Advances in Chinese Military and Uncrewed Technology”.

March 9, 2026: Prof. Paul Webster Hare, Master Lecturer, Boston University. “Diplomacy and Negotiation: Cuba and Latin America”.

March 23, 2026: Louis Mead Treadwell, 11th Lieutenant Governor of Alaska and Former Chair of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission. "High Latitudes and High Stakes: Economics, Environment and Security in an Accessible Arctic." 

April 7, 2026, TUESDAY: Ambassador Douglas Lute, [usa ret.] Former assistant to President Bush and National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan. “A Global National Security Conversation.” 

Available to members
in our archives:

November 3: Distinguished Fellow Barbara Slavin of the Stimson Center in Washington, “Conflict: Iran.”

November 17: Edward Luce, National Editor of the Financial Times, Author of "ZBIG", a Cold War biography of Zbigniew Brzezinski.

December 8: William Taylor [US Ambassador ret. Ukraine]: Distinguished Fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center. "Russia's War on Ukraine: an Update"

Lecture Guests Can Sign Up Online

We've made it easier to tell others about the gem that is NCWA! Guests at our lectures can register themselves online.

Easy! All members have to do is tell their friends, family, neighbors, co-workers and other like-minded people about the superior quality of our adult and youth programs and how it helps them to better understand our rapidly changing world. Don't forget to tell them that we're nonpartisan, non-profit and a place where friendships are built. Then send them to the NCWA website's home page to register. 

Guests can reserve their free passes for one or two persons by clicking here. Or they may scan the QR code below:

Guests can reserve a seat to attend one lecture during the season for themselves and one other person. Guests are limited to only one free lecture per season, after which we hope they will consider membership.

Great Decisions will announce the details of its guest program soon.

To view NCWA's Board of Directors has adopted statements of its long-term Vision and Core Values to support its existing Mission Statement. The new statements describe our intentions for our role in the Southwest Florida community

and the values we bring to that role as we inform adults and help create the leaders of tomorrow.

Officers Leading Our Board for the Season

Mark Schwab, President

Gunther Winkler, President-Elect

NCWA Book Club 
Explores Foreign Policy

November 4: ZBIG: The Life of Zbigniew Brzezinski, America's Great Power Prophet by Edward Luce
December 2: The Man Who Would Be King: Mohammed bin Salman by Karen Elliot House.  
January 6: Wasteland by Robert Kaplan
February 4 (Wednesday): TBD
March 3: TBD
April 7: TBD
The club meets via Zoom from 12:00 to 1:30 pm usually on first Tuesdays of the month for six sessions during the season. To get on the mailing list, click here. For Zoom link and more information, go to our Book Club page.