Summers of Service

When Macalester students hear about the “service to society” component of the mission statement, they are often curious to understand how students manage to incorporate it into their college lives. International students Andrea Grimaldi ’16, Omar Mansour ’16, and Joseph Sengeh ’16 did not take long to realize the best way for them to do so was to apply for a Davis Project for Peace grant, to carry out a project in Sierra Leone the summer after their freshman year.

The three students will fly into Sierra Leone in late May, where they will work with their partner organization in Pujehun town. Over the course of eight weeks, they intend to build bathrooms in the local village and install zinc roofs on the houses, as well as run a community-wide celebratory event. Sengeh, who is from Sierra Leone himself, first learned about the Davis Peace Projects while studying at the United World College in Maastricht, Holland, and looked forward to applying once he was at Macalester.

What’s more, these are not the only Macalester students among this year’s Davis Projects for Peace recipients. Valentino Grbavac ’15 (Croatia) will spend his summer working to improve the quality of education in the town of Ljubuski, in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He plans to renovate the science classroom in an elementary school, as well as to use peace workshops to promote multi-ethnic understanding among students from different backgrounds. Grbavac, who grew up witnessing the implications of ethnic war, says his UWC education gave him a new perspective on ethnic relations. Through this project he intends to “share his experience and show that coexistence is possible.”

The Davis Project for Peace is an initiative by the late Kathryn Davis, mother of Shelby Davis, who funds the Davis UWC Scholars Program. She decided to celebrate her 100th birthday by committing $1 million to fund 100 student-led projects. Six years later, Davis Projects for Peace continues to fund grassroots projects designed by college students (studying at schools in the Davis UWC Scholars program), with the objective of encouraging and supporting “today’s motivated youth to create and try out their own ideas for building peace.” Macalester students have had 11 projects approved, at least one every year since the initiative was launched, in countries such as Peru, Cambodia, Niger and the Philippines.

But Macalester also offers its own initiative for students to create and try out their own ideas. The Live It! Fund, created by the college’s Institute of Global Citizenship Student Council, grants student awards ranging from $500 to $10,000 to carry out projects during the summer or J-term. Students are asked to draw from the core values of the school, namely academic excellence, multiculturalism, internationalism and civic engagement, to live out their definitions of global citizenship.

The Live it! Fund has also attracted some international students to run projects this summer. In a month I will be heading back to my home country of Brazil to renovate a community center in rural Montes Claros, along with Carolyn Gilbert ’15 (Montpelier, Vt.). Mariana Roa Oliva ’13 (Mexico City) will also be returning home to kick-start a grassroots education project. Bringing in people with a variety of skills and experiences, she’ll open a “space for free classes, events, and resources for artistic creation and community organizing in Mexico City.”

According to Project for Peace winner Sengeh, Macalester “puts a lot of effort into making sure students can carry out their own projects.” The Live it! Fund and the Action Fund (for Twin Cities projects) not only give students service opportunities but also give them experience in grant writing and project planning. Says Sengeh, opportunities like these allow students “to go out and experience, and finally put into practice what they had put down on paper.”

For more information  

Davis Projects for Peace: davisprojectsforpeace.org/

The Live it! Fund: macalester.edu/igc/igcstudentcouncil/liveitfund/

The Action Fund: macalester.edu/cec/scholarshipsawards/actionfund/

Take the useful, leave the rest.

On the first day of my philosophy class at the Institute of Buddhist Dialectics, Geshe Kelsang Wangmo-la begun her presentation of the Buddha’s life with an assurance that despite her maroon monastic robes and closely shaven head, she was not there to convert anyone. Instead, Geshe-la instructed us to listen over the coming months with an open mind. “Take the bits you find useful,” she said, “and just leave the rest.” 

As our studies continued, it became obvious that Geshe-la’s words were not merely a piece of rhetoric used to satisfy the critical minds of Western students, but rather a crucial part of Buddhist doctrine. With each new topic we encountered, the importance of the process of listening, contemplating, and meditating on Buddhist teachings was drilled into our minds. According to Buddhists, it is only through this three-fold familiarization with an idea that one can decipher its meaning and decide whether it accords with reality. I am still in the process of contemplating what I have encountered since my time in India began in January. Yet the individuals I have had the opportunity to listen to have given me plenty of useful bits and pieces to consider.

For example, His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s call to implement an introduction to secular ethics into the education of children worldwide has caused me to reflect on the notion of secularism and whether moral education ought to be included in Western schools. In our private audience with His Holiness, he spoke of the American case and provided a vision of how the incorporation of morality into American institutions may be useful.

Between jokes followed by rolling laughter that echoed across our group, His Holiness stated that while religion is an individual matter, the use of a moral guide in how one lives one’s life is useful to those making decisions at all levels of society. Though I am still unsure how such a union of morality and secular institutions could work on a practical level, these thoughts have caused me to examine and reevaluate my own assumptions about religion, morality, secularism and the role of philosophy in the modern world.

Yet nothing has challenged me more than Geshe Kelsang Wangmo-la’s philosophy class. As a philosophy major, I came to India with a very specific vision of what philosophy ought to be and how one ought to study it. Presented with a slew of Buddhist doctrines and a close examination of the path to enlightenment from an insider’s perspective I was taken by surprise, and, at first, quite resistant. When questions in class were shut down, I became frustrated; when they were answered only from a Buddhist viewpoint, even more so.

When this happened, Geshe-la remained patient and kind. Eventually her calm confidence penetrated my bad attitude and I began to do what I should have been doing all along—listening, respectfully, with an open mind. Though there were still moments that irked me, I tried to employ the advice Geshe-la opened her class with, taking the bits I found useful and leaving the rest. Once I did that I was able to enjoy the experience for what it was:  learning Buddhist philosophy from the first female Geshe in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. As I go into my independent research period with Geshe-la as my advisor, I am overcome with excitement to work with such an incredible, intelligent individual. So much so, in fact, that it was she, not the Dalai Lama, that I made sure to stand next to in the picture taken at our private audience with His Holiness. I hope that Geshe-la’s mentorship is among those things I will take with me when my time in India ends.          

Though meeting the Dalai Lama and taking a class from the first female Geshe were incredible experiences, the conversations I’ve had with friends in this program have given me just as much to contemplate. From discussions about education reform to gender equality to terrorism to the role of spirituality in our lives we have challenged each other endlessly and grown together as a group in a way that exemplifies all the clichés about “finding yourself” abroad. We struggle with selfhood. We listen to each other’s fears. We hike in the mountains and dance in the rain. We hug each other at the end of the day to remind ourselves that as difficult as this experience can be, we are all in it together.

And it has certainly been difficult at times. I can’t wait to leave behind the endlessly leaky plumbing, leering eyes of men on the street, and, of course, the monkeys. Yet as Geshe-la said, “Take the bits you find useful, and just leave the rest.” Fortunately, the useful bits seem to be endless and what I leave behind will be past and gone. With just over three weeks left here in the foothills of the Himalayas, I hope to uncover even more that I can take with me, especially a propensity to listen, contemplate, and meditate on whatever comes my way.  

5 Words You Might Want To Look Up On Wikipedia Before You Come to Mac

Spend a year or two taking humanities classes at Macalester College and you'll begin to notice a pattern. Major theoretical currents run through multiple disciplines and some concepts can permeate departments as diverse as English and Economics (think homo economicus and Robinson Crusoe). Because of this fraternization of the fields there are a few concepts which most Mac students are familiar with, each possessing a few key terms that we often refer to as Mac "buzz words". President Rosenberg's much-loved President's Day video features one of these words, when he drops the "hegemony" line on a table of Mac students, sending them instantly abuzz with discussion. In order to brush up on your esoteric academician's vocabulary, here's a quick breakdown of a few key concepts you're likely to encounter in a Macalester classroom.

1) Hegemony || n. \ˈhe-jə-ˌmō-nē\ 
Classes where you're likely to encounter this term: Sociology, Political Science, Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies, American Studies, Latin American Studies, African Studies, International Relation, History

Hegemony is all about dominance and the pervasive--typically coercive--spread of influence. Traditionally a descriptor of geopolitical arrangements (as in "the USA and USSR each sought regional hegemony during the Cold War"), hegemony can also be appropriated more inventively to describe cultural phenomena (such as "the hegemony of American pop music").

Fun Fact: Macalester's humor magazine, The Hegemonocle pays homage to this frequently-touted term.

2) Heteronormative || adj. \,hĕt'ə-rō'nôr'mə-tĭv\
Classes where you're likely to encounter this term: Sociology, Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies, American Studies, Anthropology, Psychology

Heteronormative is an adjective encompassing any behavior or phenomena that renders same-sex couples and/or queer communities invisible. Heteronormativity interprets sex and sexuality into fixed, stable and distinct categories popularly interpreted in the culture as the "traditional" viewpoint (e.g. "traditional marriage" = 1 ♂ + 1 ♀).

Fun Fact: Apparently heteronormativity has its own Pinterest page.

3) the "Other" || n. \ˈə-thər\
Classes where you're likely to encounter this term: Sociology, Anthropology, African Studies, Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies, American Studies, Psychology, English, Philosophy, History

More or less coined by Edward Said in his canonical postcolonial text, Orientalism (1978), the Other describes any external or minority group that is either oppressed or fetishized by another dominant cultural group. The Other group is essentialized, that is, its identity is pared down into one cohesive monolith that denies the potential for variation, individuality and subjectivity within that group.

Hint: It's bad.


4) Postmodern || adj. \ˌpōs(t)-ˈmä-dərn,\
Classes where you're likely to encounter this term: Philosophy, English, Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies, Political Science, Linguistics, American Studies, Art and Art History, Music

This is a biggie: postmodernism is a philosophical movement that is skeptical of apparent realities, particularly social realities which are highly contingent on time and place. It emphasizes the role of language and power dynamics in constructing society and its systems, and is concerned with attacking concrete classifications such as straight/gay, male/female, white/black, imperial/colonial. Postmodernism is a reaction to the modernist thought that preceded it, which championed scientific objectivity.

 5) Problematize || v.  \ˈprä-blə-mə-ˌtīz\
Classes where you're likely to encounter this term: Political Science, American Studies, Anthropology, English, Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies, Philosophy, International Relations
 
The process of calling critical attention to a topic, issue, notion, behavior or some other phenomena, probably because it's racist, sexist or shores up disparities of clout in some unequal power dynamic.

Use it in a sentence: We might problematize the hegemonic heteronomativity that casts queer identities as "Other" as an attitude inconsistent with the tenets of postmodern thought.

So there you have 5 hot terms you'd be much obliged to brush up on before you make your campus debut. Try them on for size, test them out in your everyday vocabulary. You'll impress your parents and dazzle your friends! Learn how to deploy the terms ironically and you'll be even more ahead of the game ;)

Watsky and the Class of 2013

This weekend I went with some friends to see George Watsky perform. He’s a slightly nerdy white rapper type, and raps about things like being broke and struggling against The Man. He said some stuff that was pretty great, especially to hear about one month and four days before graduation.

He reminded the crowd (although, to be honest, it felt like he was talking to me specifically when he said this) that for every performance he gives, there are dozens of failed tries and unseen struggles to get where he is now. The chipping away behind the scenes is where the real work happens, and even though you don’t always see it, it happens. We don’t publicize it, we’re not proud of it, but it happens.

This advice feels very pertinent to this moment-before-graduation when it seems as if everyone has either 100 percent or 0 percent solidified their plans. For every amazing internship landed, it’s hard to believe there were several unsuccessful (or more often unacknowledged) applications submitted elsewhere. The reality is that each member of the class of 2013 has worked incredibly hard to get to this point, and will probably face innumerable obstacles and unforeseen challenges before we Get There.

As Watsky says, keep chipping away!

Relay for Life @ Mac

On Friday, Macalester held its 5th annual Relay for Life at our indoor track and field complex. 30 teams of students brought blankets, pillows, card games, snacks, frisbees, and basketballs, and camped out overnight. I was proud to be the captain of team Medicinal Melodies, and to provide over an hour of live music for the walkers, runners--even bikers and skateboarders!--taking their shifts on the track.

Relay for Life is an all-night vigil honoring cancer victims, survivors, and caretakers. At least one member of each team must be walking around the track, from 6 that night until 6 the next morning. Leading up to the event, each team member works toward a personal fundraising goal for the American Cancer Society. We do this each year hoping that someday, we won't have to do it anymore.

The night alternates between solemn ceremony and lighthearted optimism. We encourage each other with our joy throughout the night, just as we would encourage a loved one battling a ruthless disease. My shifts of circling the track involved more running, skipping, and dancing than actual walking.  Off the track, I painted a few faces to fundraise for our team.

I am involved in 3 different music groups on campus, and they all performed on the stage next to the track: Medicinal Melodies, The Sirens (all female a cappella) and the jazz ensemble my friends and I put together for academic credit. Singing and playing 3 sets of music was hectic, but fun. In addition to student bands, a number by the Irish Dance troupe, a juggling lesson, and goofy contests kept everyone going.

There isn't a lot of pressure to stay until 6 AM. Many of us have homework, rehearsals, or work commitments the next day. I did make it long enough to hear my friend Beth speak about working with Mac staff and students to organize a bone marrow registry drive on campus. Only by making small changes, she said, 

can we work toward bigger ones. As Relayers, our small change was raising a grand total of $21,000 for cancer research.

This is my third year being part of Relay for Life.  Between performing, traversing the track, and hanging out with teammates, it is always a highlight of my spring semester. Possibly even my year.

My Internship

As a final semester senior, I got onto the internship bandwagon a bit late. However, my experience this semester as an Immigration Services intern for the International Institute of Minnesota has been phenomenal.



I became aware of the internships at the Institute thanks to both the Internship Office's website and the emails I receive through the International Studies department. Organizations tend to have good luck with Mac students as interns from what I hear so many communicate directly with the various departments on campus who then communicate news of internships to their majors first. In fact, I am one of at least 5 Mac students interning at the Institute right now (I work Tuesday and Thursday afternoons so I don't see everyone working there). I am doing this internship on top of an almost full course load which worried me at first but once I started I realized it was completely doable (I chose not to register my internship for credit).

My job is mainly to assist the Institute's clients, mainly refugees and asylees, with their citizenship applications ensuring everything is filled out properly and that they have all of the necessary documents. The citizenship application is quite lengthy and not designed with the applicant in mind - particularly an applicant whose first language is not English. Thus, one aspect of my job is explaining what US Immigration is looking for and what some of the questions mean. For example, how do you explain what a totalitarian party is to a Somali refugee or what the word persecuted means to someone for whom English is not their first language. This is often both challenging and fun as people warm up to you when they see you are doing your best to ensure everything makes sense to them. Their are other departments within the Institute dealing with refugee resettlement, Nursing aid classes, English courses, etc. Anyone with an interest in refugees, immigration, or just for getting a feel for what working at a small non-profit is like should look into working for the Institute.

Fitness at Macalester

From 8 to 9 p.m. six nights a week you can find 15 Macalester students jumping, lunging, squatting, and sweating to the voice of Shaun T. as he motivates/yells at us to push harder and not give up.

Before this semester, I was blissfully ignorant of Insanity workouts or trainer Shaun T.  After six weeks of workouts, however, I am now very well acquainted with both, and more importantly with a new group of Macalester students who struggle and laugh over the ridiculousness of the workouts and bond over surviving them.

At the start of spring semester my housemates and I saw a posting in the Daily Piper about free physical activity classes. Insanity workouts were among the classes being offered. Unfamiliar with what a class called that might entail, we YouTubed a workout. After watching a four-minute clip of very fit people easily completing physically demanding movements, we decided to sign up as a way to make sure we were exercising regularly—and also as a way to avoid the treadmill.

With little thought beyond escaping the dreaded treadmill, we were committed. Needless to say, after the first week of workouts, as I painfully shuffled across campus, I was questioning my decision-making skills. I’ve survived eight pre-seasons of soccer workouts never before felt so sore. But with the encouragement of my housemates, we’ve all stuck it out, and continue doing our squat jumps and push-ups with Shaun T. every week. 

Insanity is one of five free physical activity classes offered this semester through Macalester’s Wellness and Health (WHAM) committee. Other classes are Juggling, Yoga for Fitness, Step Aerobics, and Zumba. Not only are the classes free to students, but students also teach the courses. WHAM classes allow students to share their interests and skills with the rest of the Macalester community, something I really appreciate.

WHAM’s free physical activity classes are just one way to keep physically active on campus. In addition to free classes, WHAM also offers other classes for a small fee. Intramural sports occur all year long, as do physical education classes for academic credit. The great range in options makes working out and staying healthy easy and fun. All these courses, along with team sports, allow students from different years and majors to meet in a relaxed social environment.

So while Shaun T. may not always be my favorite person—especially as I’m pushing myself to complete just one more tuck jump—having access to Mac’s wide variety of exercise classes, amazing facilities, and supportive peers has made staying fit a wonderful component of my college experience. 

—Alyssa Markle ’13