Reflection

As an immigrant to the United States and having lived in Virginia and Ohio before moving to Florida, one could argue I was already on my way to becoming a global citizen and learner. I enjoyed immersing myself in other cultures and learning about those different from myself, however, my experience prior to the Global Learning Medallion (GLM) was unstructured and without deeper thought. Prior to joining, I took Introduction to East Asia (ASN3410) and during one of our discussions I came across a quote from Confucius stating that "The essence of knowledge is, having it, to apply it; not having it, to confess your ignorance." Learning about these cultures that prioritized education as a foundation for society, I decided to embody the same ideals in the never-ending pursuit of knowledge. When I stumbled upon the GLM, I ended up signing up for two things: GLM itself and a minor in Asian Studies. Upon finishing the program, I think differently about the way I learn things through incorporating the key tenants of global learning: global awareness, global engagement, and global perspective. 

The ability to understand the interconnectedness of both local and global issues is the first outcome of the GLM. While GL courses focus on all three of the GL outcomes, my key takeaway from all eight of my GL courses was global awareness. In Digital Legacies and 21st Century Literacy, I became conscious of strategies, entire campaigns, and techniques in use to distract and exploit people around the world. The not so nefarious methods to create a digital campaign are skills I've kept with me to this day and have even helped me craft this portfolio. After taking Introduction to East Asia, I was able to visualize the backgrounds of major East Asian societies in a way that helped me understand past and current geopolitics as well as local issues during the COVID-19 pandemic and the "Stop Asian Hate" movement. These experiences allowed me to become an ideal candidate for the Asian Student Union executive board, where I would help craft a new platform for students interested in Asian culture to come together and celebrate the diversity and societies of all Asian nations. 

Global engagement, as defined by GLM, is to engage in local, global, international, and intercultural problem solving. In this regard, my tenure in the GLM program has driven the level at which I undertake global engagement. Prior to enrolling at FIU, I started off doing community service in my local Key Club charter and eventually became the President. With food drives, dog toy drives, homeless shelter kitchen events, and much more, our priority was to serve our home, school, and community. At FIU, I continued this trend of service in the American Chemistry Society (ACS) Chapter of the Biscayne Bay Campus. This time, I felt truly connected to the rest of the international community of ACS members in conducting our service to community. In the ACS a large focus of service events lies with educating the next generation of chemists, scientists, and learners. Using the transformative power of chemistry, we, as an organization, team up bi-yearly for National Chemistry Week (NCW) and Chemists Celebrate Earth Week (CCEW) to perform chemistry demos based on the designated theme for each of these respective weeks. This year, for example, with the theme for NCW being medicinal chemistry, our chapter volunteered at the Frost Museum of Science and the Museum of Discovery and Science to present medicinal chemistry demos to the children of the museums. During my time in GLM, I also performed research whose main focus was international problem solving. This research was in the SARS-CoV-2 Corona Virus Spike Protein to determine if there are any viable anti-viral targets within an essential protein of the virus.

Lastly, to conduct multi-perspective analysis of societal and cultural problems on a local and global scale is to have global perspective. This is where the GLM program shines for me personally. The signature event of the GLM program is the Tuesday Times Roundtable (TTR) events hosted weekly in the Student Government Association chambers. TTRs are one of the ideal ways to engage in analyzing local and global issues through the lens of the speakers and students present. In addition to the GLM program being incredibly diverse, harboring students of a broad range of majors and ethnicities, TTRs are also open to all FIU students. Being able to foster a safe learning environment for global trends and issues alongside an open medium for discourse and opinion is one of my favorite aspects of TTRs and global perspective. To complement personal contribution to perspective in TTRs, is the perspective I gained during my study abroad in South Korea. It's one thing to just learn about a culture and society inside of a bubble halfway across the world, but it's another thing to live in that culture. My stay in Korea allowed me to contextualize all of the lessons in history, intercultural aspects, urban development, geopolitical factors that I picked up within the Asian Studies Minor. In many regards, my experiences not only allow me to understand the Korean perspective, but to also think along the lines of how a Korean would. 

In the future, I will continue my service to community in the Younger Chemists Committee, a branch of the ACS that allows post-graduates to participate in ACS events and programs. The three tenants of the GLM will carry on with me and provide me with a loose structure for which to approach future global learning as I hopefully pursue post-graduate studies. Looking back at all of my experiences in the Global Learning Medallion, I proved to myself that I can embody the Confucian ideals of pursuing knowledge and in that pursuit, I could become a true global learner and citizen.