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In order to make up for missing one of the community meetings, I attended and event called Buckeye Bridge Conversations: SCS Global Services and Syngenta.  Eddie Gomez was the moderator of the meeting and he provided us with an extensive overview of his experiences in the agricultural field.  As someone that is not in the agricultural field of study, I found it interesting to listen to the opportunities for careers in this area of Ohio State.  One of my friends majors in agricultural business, and I did not fully comprehend the size of the market for agricultural around the world.  It was also nice to get their perspectives as Ohio State students because obviously that is what we are.  I think this event was definitely worth going to because it gave me a new perspective on a career path at Ohio State in the real world.  As someone that is going into the traditional business world, I thought it was intriguing to get more of an understanding of the agricultural world because this may be a huge part of the companies that i audit in the future.  Even though I missed one of the IA meetings, it was nice to go to an extra event that I could learn a lot about.

For my third event of the semester for International Affairs Scholars, I attended “Choosing our Climate: Priorities for a More Equitable and Resilient Ohio”.   I was interested in attending this event, a live webinar with Dr. Leichenko, to hear more about an issue that is relevant to our world today.  One of his main focuses was about cities will adapt to more harsh and sever weather conditions, something that I have not thought about too much.  Considering the amount of changes that would be needed to the structures, some being massive skyscrapers or gargantuan warehouses, the amount of cash needed to comply with these changes would be massive.  He also touched on how most companies are beginning to implement plans that would lead to a zero carbon neutral state, leading to a variety of questions of how quickly companies will devise, implement, and sustain such plans.  I thought this event was very interesting to attend, and would recommend it to many others within my scholars community.  As someone that does not know a ton about climate change, I thought that I learned a lot about climate change from a perspective that many others do not, from the perspectives of how such changes will lead to an altered infrastructure of our cities.

Second Event For the Semester:  For this month in International Affairs Scholars, I attended an event called “Vladimir Putin in Comparative Perspective”. Given the current events that are going on today, I thought that this event would be relevant and interesting for me to attend.  This session was ran by Professor Timothy Frye, and he did a phenomenal job at going over the things that make a leader like Vladimir Putin so interesting to learn about.  In my twenty years of life, I can see why people are so infatuated by the meme that has become Vladimir Putin’s life.  I have always heard about Putin, whether it is stuff he has done in his home country, or the collusion with Trump in the 2016 election.  Overall, I thought this event was very interesting to listen to, and I thought that it was brilliantly timed in the calendar for someone like me to go to. Obviously I have heard about the stuff going on in Ukraine, but I do not go as in depth on the research for these topics as other people do.  That is usually why I am so interested in what these scholars have to say because they have an exponentially better understanding of these topics than I do.

February Post:  During the month of February, I attended the “Why Aren’t Americans More Alarmed By-White Supremacist Violence”.  I thought this event would have been interesting to attend because of the relevance it has to current events in our world.  Since the events of Charlotte, North Carolina, the topic of white supremacy definitely gained some momentum.  This session was lead by doctoral candidate Victoria Gurevich, and she did a fantastic job at laying down the foundation for a fantastic conversation.  In a world where diversity and inclusivity is becoming more talked about, white supremacists not only pose a threat to those ideas, but threaten the standing stones of our democracy.  I thought that this seminar was very intriguing and provided a unique insight into a topic that I had a relatively good understanding of.  I would recommend this event to anyone that wants to further their knowledge on a topic that is becoming more prevalent in the topic of international affairs.  As someone that does not spend a large chunk of my time looking at current events, I thought this event gave me an increased background on the topics, and gave me a thorough understanding of the ramifications of white supremacy.

Post #3 Semester 1: For my monthly event for the month of November/December, I attended “When are we going to win again”: Hockey and politics in Putin’s Russia with Bruce Berglund.  As someone that is relatively uninformed when it comes to the history of the United States and our relations with Russia/ the Soviet Union, I found a lot of pleasure in listening to Mr. Berglund over the digital platform of Facebook Live.  One of the main focuses of the discussion was hockey, a sport that meant more than just a scoreboard during the times that the United States went on the ice rink against the Soviet Union.  Because this related to sports a little bit, it was very engaging to listen to.  Overall,  I thought that this event was very intriguing because of the interest I have for sports and their history around the world.  Even though I struggled to completely understand the more modern political discussions that happened about what was going on in Russia, I found the speaker to be one that hand picked information to engage his audience in an effective manner.  I would recommend this session to anyone that has interest for sports and how they mean more to countries than just a game between two teams.

For my International Affairs Scholars event for the month of October, I went to “The Hardest Place: The American military and the war in Afghanistan.  Hosted by Wesley Morgan, this event allowed for a first hand account of several happenings in the Afghan region. As someone that rarely consumes any current events, I was intrigued by what he described as the remote corner of the country where U.S. military action was heavily concentrated, the Pech valley.  Morgan pointed out that the terrain of this area made it an easily accessible, but effective hiding spot as America made strong pursuits in the war on terror.  As he recaps his first visit, I was astounded by the fact that his first visit was in college.  I could not fathom going over to Afghanistan in the early 2010s as a student.  Overall, I thought this event was really interesting, mainly because of how relevant it is in today’s society.  Considering we recently pulled our troops out of Afghanistan, it was interesting to reflect on the past decade we spent occupying the Middle East.  One thing I liked about Wesley was that he was very informative and provided his own anecdotes from his experiences.

The event that I will be re-capping for International Affairs Scholars for the month of September will be the “Fiction and Fact About Critical Race Theory” event that took place over CarmenZoom.  This event, hosted by Harvey Graff, PhD on critical race theory.  A very controversial topic in today’s society, Dr. Graff approached the topic with as much of a neutral stance as he could.  As someone that has very little prior knowledge of the subject, what I took away from the conversation is that critical race theory centers around how race is taught in our educational systems.  Because the ideas that our put into children’s heads are very important, considering they are the future of our society, this topic is not treaded on lightly by passionate critics of either side.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this webinar for most people in the International Affairs Scholars Community.  I thought that the speaker, Dr. Graff, was well-qualified to deliver an exceptional presentation, which he did.  He also answered a few questions that people had, showing his thorough knowledge of the subject, and ability to think on the spot.  Because of the nature of the subject, I did not agree with everything that Dr. Graff said, but that is okay because I enjoy listening to various perspectives on important issues in today’s society.

Event 1:

For my first event for International Affairs in the months of April/May, I attended Military Frontiers Graduate Symposium.  During this event, there were numerous speakers from the military, obviously, each providing a unique perspective on important issues that our country is currently facing.  Looking at some of these issues, they consist of national and international security, military and society, war and peace.  Although I am not as familiar with these topics because I am a finance major, I was able to draw a lot of relevant information from these esteemed speakers.  Especially with the world we currently find ourselves in, with an unprecedented pandemic, there were a lot of things that these military graduates had to unpack for someone like me to understand.  In addition, there was also a large conversation about the new frontiers in Cold War research, and accounts about experiences during the war.  In my opinion, I think this event was very knowledge-inducing because of the unfamiliarity of this subject to me.  As someone that has a lot of family that have served out country via the military, I have a lot of respect for what these graduates represent for our country, and how they carry themselves in their daily lives.

Event 2:

For my second event for International Affairs in the months of April/May, I attended the Final Current Events Catch Up Night, hosted by Sammantha Zimmerman.  As someone that does not pay a ton of attention to the news, due to the numerous skews that have plagued our news outlets with extreme bias, to the left and right, I was able to learn a lot from the Kahoot that we partook in.  One of the questions that caught me off guard was about Stonehenge and whether it would have been destroyed, and that made me wonder if one of the most infamous monuments was going to be eradicated by a governing body.  I thought Sammantha did a phenomenal job with the presentation slides, she picked some topics that really interested college kids, like the Google lawsuit.  In my opinion, I thought that this event was something that should continue to be available for IA scholars in the next couple years, especially with all of the protests taking place this past year.  This event allowed for a laid back, care free atmosphere where we went on kahoot, and just listened to what was going on with the world.

IA Posts (February/March)

For my first event for the months February/March, I attended the “Challenge of Global Governance: Japan’s Role”.  From this event, I had the chance to venture into a new branch of international affairs that I was not familiar with, concerning previous events that I have attended.  Listening to Christina Davis, from Harvard University, it was clear that she was very passionate and knowledgable from the conversation she had with the attendants of the meeting.  A point that she brought up that gave me optimism was that both Japan practice a free market economy, as well as democratic values, meaning that the core principles of our countries are set in a solid stone.  In addition, Mrs. Davis mentioned that in order for Japan to maintain global governance, they must maintain strong relations with other regions of Asia.  Overall, I thought this event was a fantastic one to attend, and it was very unique to the other ones I have been to.  I am not very knowledgeable about Japan, I have been to other events with Russia, other regions of Africa…etc, but Japan is a country that fascinates me because of how little I know about.  Since we were able to engage in a quality discussion about certain elements surrounding the regions of Japan, I really enjoyed it.

The second event that I attended for the months of February/March was the Breathe Hope Service Spotlight session.  It was a fantastic presentation with Alexis and Elizabeth about an organization on Ohio State’s campus that I was unfamiliar with, making it engaging.  Breathe Hope is focused on efforts to help people with cystic fibrosis, a disease without a cure at the moment, that affects the things in our body responsible for mucus production in the body.  Because of this struggle, this often leaves people with fluids filling their lungs, blocking passageways in the body, not to mention the multitude of side effects that result from these problems.  Alexis and Elizabeth went into extensive detail on the events that they host through their organization.  Although many components of the organization have been moved to Zoom, not a shocker, it looks like a club that would be very fulfilling to be a part of.  Breathe Strong makes sure to push into Buckeyethon every year, as well as put on other fundraising events to make as much money as possible for the kids.  They ended their discussion on a very heartwarming note, saying they hope that CF stands for “cure found” in the near future, and I can emphatically agree with that sentiment.

Event 1:

For my first event in the month of January/February for International Affairs Scholars, I attended the meeting called “U.S. International media in the Era of Disinformation”.  In this event, we had three main guest speakers that went in depth on the differences in media amongst different nations in the world, as well as current events analysis from the media standpoint.  Beginning the conversation talking about what the media in the United States provides and does not provide, Jeffrey Trimble mentioned that the media isn’t necessarily obligated by a contract to gives us the most accurate, unbiased source of information.  Instead, it is supposed to bring people together to spread the knowledge of democracy to the consumers of said news.  Trimble also pointed to the fact that Russia is pushing the narrative that the United States is descending into Civil War as we speak, and obviously the United States has not been the best over the past couple of weeks, but we are not going that far.  From this event, I was able to gain insight into different aspects of the national media, how the government uses discretionary money to invest in the media.  I also learned that the media is so controversial nowadays because of the numerous skews present in our daily news.

Event 2:

For my second event for the month of January/February, I attended “Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: Continuing the Legacy”, an intriguing seminar that provided a new but welcomed perspective on the life of Dr. King, and the Office of Diversity and Inclusion.  First, we learned about what the Office of Diversity and Inclusion is and its role at The Ohio State University.  The Office of Diversity and Inclusion specifically helps anyone that may not be universally accepted in today’s society: LGBTQ community, minorities, and other underrepresented groups in today’s society.  The Office of Diversity and Inclusion originated from the systemic racism that is prevalent in today’s society, and this office wanted to allow for a safe space at predominantly white institutions, making these ostracized groups feel at home.  In addition, Doctor James Luther Moore provided a phenomenal quote that stood out to me during the webinar, a quote from a student of color at Ohio State in 1970.  The quote referenced that this person was more surprised that there was a black president at Ohio State than he was when President Obama was elected.  This program was one that I enjoyed, mainly because the speakers were really engaging and likeable people.