Hello and goodbye readers!

I swear being the last class blogger of the term is definitely worth the little extra stress that comes along with term papers and final assignments because I always get to read the most intriguing and personal blog posts from my classmates. The year has certainly flown by quite fast and reading through everyones blogs made me realize how much we’ve all accomplished and I thought that was pretty cool.

I really enjoyed Amy’s final blog as she returned to the question that has been floating around our classes for the entire year: “What does it mean to be a Global Citizen?”. I like coming back to this thought every once in a while, but like Amy I am also rather conflicted when I attempt to answer it, despite becoming much more knowledgable throughout the year. Amy brought up interesting reminders in her post though, as she reviewed all of our assigned readings and elaborated on what each book contributed to the golden question of the year. This was perhaps the best way to track our development in ASTU and i’d argue that all the knowledge we’ve obtained from each of our readings is the reason that describing a global citizen is so complicated.

What I liked about Ben’s blog is how he reflected on the big strides we as a class of global citizens made this year in recognizing and interpreting world events. I found what Ben was describing relatable to what I feel I can take out of being in this stream this year because in this class I have been able to really broaden my understanding of how the world as a society works and to look deeper and never stop asking questions in regards to world issues.

Lauren shared an intimate story in her blog this week when she discussed grieving a hometown friend who had passed away this year and pointed out how our topic of trauma and specifically public grievance arose quickly in her own personal life. Certainly a saddening blog post, but the comparisons Lauren made to ASTU material made me think about how complex but real the topics we discussed in ASTU this year really were. I know I will always have instances in my life that I will be able to relate back to certain complicated material we discussed in ASTU.

In this final send off to the ASTU blogging page I’d like to just say how much I actually appreciated the blogging aspect of this course as it was definitely a helpful tool to discover new ideas in a more creative fashion, while also being able to look at the original ideas that my fellow classmates were producing. And with that goodbye bloggers!

-A.J.