College Scholars at Home and Abroad
Second-year student Alina Clay spent eight weeks this summer at the Kathryn Davis School of Russian in Middlebury, Vermont, where she took the language pledge and spoke only Russian for the duration of the program. After auditing first-year Russian at UT, she placed into third-level Russian at Middlebury and at the end of the program, tested with “Intermediate high” proficiency in the language. Not only did she immerse herself in the language, but she also learned more about Russian culture through participating in the school’s Russian choir, which practiced several times a week and ultimately put on a traditional folk concert. Alina also regularly attended lectures by noteworthy Russian literary scholars and journalists, as well as watched classic movies, prepared traditional food and even participated in Russian karaoke night. She had the opportunity to often speak with professors and other students who either lived in Russia or often traveled there, all of whom offered her advice about where best to travel in regards to her academic interests. This immersion program gave Alina valuable linguistic and cultural experience, as if she were in Russia. Indeed, though the language pledge was dissolved on the last night of the program, Alina refused to revert to English until she had arrived back home.
In the spring of 2014, after receiving the Joseph B. Kennedy Scholarship from the College Scholars Program, Jack Little returned to China and studied at the University of Nottingham in Ningbo, China. In a smaller city just south of Shanghai, Jack completed an intensive Chinese Language course and studied American, Chinese, and Russian foreign policy. After the semester was completed, Jack spent several weeks hostel hopping across China before returning to the Knoxville.
In the summer of 2014, Jack began working for a local foundation and NGO that seeks to alleviate children at risk issues in South East Asia and Haiti. Working a one year internship, he has traveled with organization staff to Thailand and the Philippines. While there, he participated in stakeholder and exploratory interviews with local grassroots organizations, international anti-trafficking initiatives, and government agencies. He is currently working with the director of the foundation on a research based inquiry into issues facing children in rural Appalachia.
Dylan Haywood traveled to Savannah, Georgia this past July to conduct the first of many interviews for her Senior Project. Her Senior Project (as of now) will analyze the effectiveness of Restorative Justice proceses and will include interviews from various lawyers, Restorative Justice activists and other scholars in this field. In Savannah she interviewed Robert Bush, a Senior Staff Attorney at Georgia Legal Services Program. Robert Bush is a long-time equal rights lawyer and activist for HIV/AIDS patients, an active supporter of LGBTQ campaigns, and other social justice programs. Through Georgia Legal he has been able to serve impoverished communities, help marginalized populations find housing, and fight for fair treatment of the underrepresented. Dylan talked to him mostly about his opinions on Restorative Justice practices and problems within the Retributive Justice system that we currently have in the United States. She also took photographs of Robert, which she plan to do for all of my interviews, to be displayed in her presentation of her Senior Project.