About Us
Board of Directors
Corporate Members
Staff
The Columbia World Affairs Council is a member of the national World Affairs Councils of America network with 40 State Member councils, plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, over 350,000  participants, and many affiliated organizations.

The Columbia World Affairs Council is also a member of the South Carolina Association of Nonprofit Organizations (SCANPO), the statewide network of nonprofit organizations.

Dickson Monk:
​Executive Director

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Dickson Monk joined the Columbia World Affairs Council in June of 2016, becoming executive director in January 2017. After eight years of working in the publishing industry at Bruccoli, Clark, Layman, he joined Columbia’s nonprofit community as communications manager for the Columbia Museum of Art and, later, as director of marketing and communications at Historic Columbia. Dickson also serves on the boards of South Carolina Sister Cities, Columbia Council for Internationals, International Association of Business Communicators of South Carolina, and the Midlands Anchor Advisory Board. Dickson can be contacted at dmonk@columbiaworldaffairs.org

Bob Coble:
​Chairman

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Bob Coble, former Mayor of the City of Columbia, joined the Columbia World Affairs Council as Chairman in 2010. Aside from his leadership in Columbia World Affairs Council, Bob is a leader within Nexsen Pruet. He serves as chair of the firm’s South Carolina Public Policy and Governmental Affairs Group.  He has also been named Ambassador of the Year by the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce and serves on the Columbia Urban League Board. 

Fred Monk:  
Chairman Emeritus

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Fred Monk helped create the Columbia World Affairs Council, which has helped the Midlands of South Carolina develop an international awareness and international relationships.
 
He was designated chairman emeritus and currently serves on the board of directors of the council. He was involved in forging South Carolina’s sister-state relationships with Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany and with Queensland, Australia, as well as Columbia's sister-city relationships with Kaiserslautern, Germany; Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Plovdiv, Bulgaria; Accra, Ghana; Chelyabinsk, Russia; Yibin, China; and Taichung City, Taiwan.
 
Fred is a graduate of the University of South Carolina and worked at The State and The Columbia Record from 1970-1997 and was business editor of The State from 1981 to 1997. He helped develop and served as president of The South Carolina Export Consortium, a non-profit organization that helped small to medium-size companies identify and export to international markets, from 1997 to 2014. He represented South Carolina on the Appalachian Regional Commission’s Export Trade Advisory Council. He currently serves as Senior Advisor, International Strategy & Trade, at the South Carolina Department of Commerce.
 
He served in the U.S. Navy during Vietnam, and later was the Public Affairs Officer with the South Carolina National Guard, retiring with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He is a past president of the national Society of American Business Editors & Writers, and served on the partnership board of the USC College of Journalism and Mass Communication. He helped create the 3 Rivers Music Festival, which he chaired in Columbia for seven years and is the former president of the Earlewood Community Citizens Organization.

Matt Maxwell:
CWAC Intern

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Matt Maxwell was born in Columbia and then raised in Bamberg, South Carolina. He is also a recent graduate of the University of South Carolina, where he studied English and Global Studies with a concentration in the European region and the French language. His interests span international relations, the promotion of the rule of law, cultural studies, developmental politics, and human rights and plans to attend law school starting this fall. His long term goal is to work with nongovernmental organizations that span the fields of international/transnational law, human rights, and economic development; all the while, he hopes to continually invest in South Carolina by connecting his roots here to his work abroad. He is very excited to join the Columbia World Affairs Council and knows that this is one of the first major steps for pursuing his ambitions. Matt can be reached at programs@columbiaworldaffairs.org.