Ambassador John E Lange Scholarship for Study Abroad in Africa

This scholarship is intended to support undergraduate students studying abroad in Sub-Saharan Africa, including those who have an interest in global health, for a semester (fall or spring) or year.

Preference will be given to applicants with a grade point average of at least 3.0 and to applicants who are Wisconsin residents. The recipients must not have studied abroad with IAP before and must have demonstrated financial need as determined by the Office of Student Financial Aid. It is preferred that at least one of the scholarships will be applied to the study of global health.

John Lange, BA ’71 JD ’75, established the Ambassador John E. Lange Scholarship for Study Abroad in Africa to help UW-Madison undergraduates expand their horizons through study in Sub-Saharan Africa, where he spent many years as a diplomat.

Lange grew up in Muskego, Wisconsin. He had a distinguished 28-year career in the Foreign Service at the U.S. Department of State, where he received awards for his leadership in a crisis at the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam, served as Ambassador to Botswana, and was a pioneer in global health diplomacy and pandemic preparedness and response.

During his career at the State Department, Ambassador Lange served as the Special Representative on Avian and Pandemic Influenza (2006-2009); Deputy Inspector General; Deputy U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator at the inception of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief; and Associate Dean for Leadership and Management at the Foreign Service Institute, where he directed the federal government’s highest-level civilian/military joint training program. Earlier, he was the U.S. Ambassador to Botswana and Special Representative to the Southern African Development Community (1999-2002), where he oversaw operations of seven U.S. Government agencies and made the fight against HIV/AIDS his signature issue.

Lange headed the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, as Chargé d’Affaires at the time of the August 7, 1998, Al-Qaeda terrorist bombing, for which he received the State Department’s Distinguished Honor Award for “skilled leadership” and “extraordinary courage.” Earlier, he served at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, and at U.S. Embassies in Lomé, Togo; Paris, France; and Mexico City, Mexico. He also had tours of duty in the State Department Bureaus of African Affairs, Western Hemisphere Affairs, and Management in Washington.

After retiring as a Senior Foreign Service Officer in 2009, Lange spent four years at the Gates Foundation engaging in high-level advocacy with African governments and international organizations to advance the foundation’s global health and development goals. In 2013, he moved to the United Nations Foundation as Senior Fellow for Global Health Diplomacy and held leadership positions in the Global Polio Eradication Initiative and the Measles and Rubella Initiative.

Prior to joining the diplomatic service in 1981, he worked for five years at the United Nations Association-USA in New York.

At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Ambassador Lange chairs the Board of Visitors of the Global Health Institute and is a member of the Board of Visitors of the International Division. He also is a member of DACOR (Diplomatic and Consular Officers, Retired), the American Society of International Law, and the American Foreign Service Association.

Lange is a “distinguished graduate” of the National War College (M.S. in national security strategy, 1996); a graduate cum laude of the University of Wisconsin Law

School (J.D., 1975); and a graduate “with distinction” of the University of Wisconsin-Madison (B.A. in political science, 1971). In 1978, he studied public international law at The Hague Academy of International Law. He was admitted to the State Bar in Wisconsin (1975) and New York (1979). He speaks English and Spanish fluently and has working proficiency in French. He is married and has one daughter.