Collin Walsh ’13 named a Careers & The disABLED magazine “National Employee of the Year”

On the third day of Foreign Service orientation as a U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security Service special agent candidate, Collin Walsh couldn’t walk.

The 2013 Maurer School of Law alumnus had been experiencing mild symptoms, like skin sensitivity in his legs, over the previous week, but didn’t make anything of it.

In that first week of DSS training, Walsh went from mild symptoms to near complete immobility. Seemingly overnight, the former NCAA All-American middle-distance runner couldn’t move.

He’d worked tirelessly to get there, first as a political science student at Southern Connecticut State University—where he earned a prestigious White House internship with President George W. Bush—then as a law student in Bloomington, then back to Connecticut as a police officer before embarking on the rigorous process of joining the State Department’s law enforcement division.

So when doctors diagnosed him with a rare form of Multiple Sclerosis in 2016, Walsh felt like everything he’d worked for suddenly disappeared.

“When I became ill, I essentially lost my dream,” he said. “I had to resign from the Foreign Service, which was emotionally very difficult to do. But I had to do it when I lost the required medical clearance.”

Walsh is six years in to a remarkable rehabilitation and recovery after initially being paralyzed from the chest down. And while Multiple Sclerosis may have slowed him physically, it’s only strengthened his resolve to be a federal servant—and to, quite unexpectedly, become a national advocate for the strength and resilience of the disability community.

His drive and passion have earned notice. In late July, Walsh was recognized as a 2022 Careers & The disABLED magazine “National Employee the Year.”  He is one of only three employees throughout the entire federal government to earn the honor, and the State Department’s sole honoree.

Before we get to that, however, we have to go back to the mid-00s, when Walsh was a student at SCSU. Intrigued by policy and the politics that drive them, Walsh pursued a degree in political science, eventually earning his internship with President Bush.

“From that point forward, I could only think about getting to Washington, D.C. and joining the federal government,” he said. “After studying political science, and with ambitions to pursue a career in federal law enforcement, law school seemed like the next step.” He spent two years as a financial analyst before sending out applications for law school.

Walsh knew practically nothing about Indiana, let alone its law school in Bloomington, but he wanted a new environment and a change of pace, and when he heard about Maurer’s international opportunities, he knew he’d found his home for the next three years.

Among the many opportunities students have at the Law School, international exchange programs can be some of the most enticing. After all, who wouldn’t enjoy the prospect of spending a semester in Dublin, Madrid, or Milan? In addition to the exchange programs, the Law School had recently launched the Stewart Global Fellows program. Thanks to the generosity of Milt ’71, and Judi Stewart, student leaders were beginning to have fully funded international summer work opportunities.

India was—and is—one such opportunity. Knowing that, Walsh became the first Indiana Law exchange student with the Jindal Global Law School near New Delhi.

“If I didn’t know anything about Indiana, imagine what I knew about India,” he said.

“I went to India very much as the ‘All-American guy,’ so when I first got there, I couldn’t yet appreciate its beauty. I was constantly on Expedia looking for flights home. But by the third week, I began to love the culture.”

The culture wasn’t the only thing he fell in love with.

Walsh met his future wife, Amika, then an Indian law student at the same university, during that semester exchange. Meeting her prompted Walsh to explore options for staying in India, and as luck—or fate—would have it, the Law School’s Stewart Fellowship program had an opening for him. Walsh worked at a Mumbai corporation and a New Delhi international law firm before returning to Bloomington to finish law school.

After earning his JD in the spring of 2013, Walsh delayed taking the bar exam. He won the State Department’s prestigious Critical Language Scholarship, which sent him to Bangladesh for two months. Next, he joined the Connecticut Police Academy. To no one’s surprise, he finished first in his 2014 class. He got in his car right after giving his graduating class’s commencement speech, drove through the night to Washington, D.C., and passed his Foreign Service oral assessment on no sleep.

Though the interview went well, Walsh’s phone didn’t ring immediately. And it didn’t for another two years.

When it did, in April 2016, Walsh was ecstatic. Years of work had finally paid off.

And then, “his greatest honor met his worst nightmare,” wrote Rachel Schindel Gombis, an Office Director in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, in her nomination letter for Walsh’s “National Employee of the Year” award.

On his third day of orientation, those week-long symptoms that had persisted became paralyzing—literally. For a man who used to blaze through lap after lap of the collegiate distance medley relay, not being able to move his legs was a shock.

“I put my entire life and soul into this goal of getting into the Foreign Service—it’s the whole reason I became a police officer and went to law school,” Walsh said. “With my physical functionality suddenly gone, I feel like I lost almost everything else. All I had was Amika.”

The news only got worse.

“The very best doctors who specialize in MS unanimously offered no hope,” he said. “They told me I was only going to get worse, that I’d never recover.”

Amika had other ideas.

“She said that if the American doctors we’d been seeing couldn’t find a path forward, we’d go to India and recruit a new medical team,” Walsh said. “Out of fear, everyone pleaded with us not to go. But what did we have to lose?”

Amika’s grandfather became his primary doctor in India. A radical change in diet, the addition of nutritional supplements, and extensive physical therapy started to yield improvements in Walsh’s mobility.

“We stayed in India for a year,” he said. “After three months, I was taking small steps. After four, I was going up stairs.”

Today Walsh walks with the assistance of elbow-supported walking sticks and uses a wheelchair to cover longer distances. Through sheer determination and will, he has turned his medical prognosis into a source of inspiration to continue improving with every step.

When he was diagnosed with MS, Walsh lost the medical clearance needed to continue working in the role he wanted. “Losing my medical ‘worldwide availability’ was fatal to my Foreign Service career,” he said.

But he made it his mission to get back.

In 2020, he won the Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellowship, earning him full funding for a master’s degree at the Georgetown University Walsh School of Foreign Service and, at its completion, an appointment as a Foreign Service Officer.  It seemed his determination was bringing him full circle.

“Winning the Pickering Fellowship was phase one of what I call my vindication,” Walsh said. “Finally, I was back on a pathway to becoming a diplomat. But it all hinged on winning back the medical clearance I tragically lost. It was a difficult process—I got rejected three times along the way—but the State Department was excellent in helping me find a way forward.”

In addition to his responsibilities as a fellow and full-time graduate student, Walsh has served full-time in the Department’s Civil Service as a Foreign Affairs Officer, a position he’s held since 2018.

“I’m now scheduled to rejoin the Foreign Service in 2023,” he said.

The mobility issues Walsh faces give him important insight into accessibility issues. He provides substantial input into improving access for the disabled in his 24-floor building.

“At first I wanted to make the building accessible to me,” he said. “I thought the doors should open for me. But as I was walking around, I saw other employees using wheelchairs, others who face difficulty moving around, so I thought, why not make this a wholesale effort?”

Walsh credits U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken for his pioneering leadership and his home bureau, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS), with helping to make those changes happen.

“I lobbied for a comprehensive response from DS leadership,” Walsh said, “and to my delight, they agreed.”

Walsh’s entire building in Arlington, VA received an accessibility overhaul: Improvements were made to elevators, restrooms, doors, offices, and more to make them easier for everyone to use.

“To get something like that done in the federal government that quickly is incredible,” he said.

As workplaces further develop their diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, Walsh hopes to add another letter to the DEI paradigm.

“Rightfully, we hear the acronym DEI frequently these days. Here at the State Department, we have DEIA—diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility,” he said. “The paradigm has expanded to include that critical ‘A’ piece now.”

Schindel Gombis credited Walsh with inspiring change in a place where it is often slow to come.

“On behalf of the disability community, (he) strives to highlight their unique abilities as indispensable benefits,” she said.

From Connecticut to Bloomington to India and Washington, D.C., Walsh’s road to success has been anything but easy. He credits the Law School’s Jay Krishnan and Lesley Davis with inspiring him along the way.

“The combination of Professor Krishnan, Dean Davis, and Milt and Judi Stewart—the four of them together—their vision and dedication to increasing and broadening the student experience internationally changed my life,” he said. “They motivated me to become a better person and to dedicate myself to improving American prosperity and security as a United States diplomat.”

Collin Walsh: Soon-to-be Foreign Service Officer, Indiana Law alumnus, Pickering Fellow, N.C.A.A. All-American athlete, disability advocate, and now, a national employee of the year.

And Amika? You’ll never believe where she is.

She’s finishing her third year in Bloomington at the Maurer School of Law.

“It’s taken so many different turns,” Walsh said of his journey, “but to be honest I’ve been steadfast in my commitment to get where I’m going. I wouldn’t have charted this path exactly how it happened, and there were no guarantees I would’ve ended up here. But I feel ecstatic and vindicated. I know absolutely that I found my perfect career and lifestyle, and am grateful for my huge team of supporters for helping me to achieve each of my dreams.”