After working hard for the past however many years, I was excited for an easy semester to focus on prepping for Bolivia and studying for the GRE. As is typical, life didn’t quite work out the way I expected and my easy semester ended up being the most draining of my life. As Brené Brown so eloquently said, “when you’re living your life in the arena, you’re going to get your ass handed to you,” and I walked out of that graduation ceremony beaten, bloody, scarred, and bruised, but far from defeated (also if you haven’t watched her Netflix special stop right now and go do so).
I was able to underload credits and was only taking three in-person classes. The final push included a Spanish class on human rights abuses in the Southern Cone of South America (we didn’t focus on Bolivia but it was included in the region we worked with), a political science class focusing on (in)tolerance, and the thesis cohort that was continuing on from the previous semester. On top of this, I was a TA for “Issues in Crime Control” which furthered my understanding of mass incarceration from a different perspective than I was used to studying.
I officially graduated with a BA in sociology of law, criminology, and deviance (LCD) with double minors in Spanish and political science. This means that my college career was spent focusing not only on how people interact with each other, or individuals with broader society, but also who gets to determine what is “criminal,” which people will be convicted of criminal acts, and from which perspective the laws are going to be written (hint: it’s not an equal distribution). I focused my Spanish studies on culture and human rights abuses and most of my political science credits came from internship work rather than the class room. My goal was to better understand how we’ve come to different inequalities both locally and globally along with socially and politically.
Part of the program was researching, writing, and presenting a senior thesis through the sociology department. While to many it seemed obvious that I would choose something related to human trafficking, I opted for a different route. The more that I’ve learned about inequality in America, the more I’ve seen the intricacies of human trafficking in the States. While it is still due to demand that trafficking thrives, one’s chances of being trafficked are greatly dependent on factors such as race, class, gender, and previous abuse. Because of the focus of race in this, the LCD track, and my work at ACER, I decided to look into this more. I’ve seen a huge need for more white allies in race-based conflict and as a white girl, it wasn’t until I got to college that I really started engaging in constructive conversations about race. I wanted to know what other white students’ experiences were and used my thesis to investigate this. I interviewed white students on campus about how they came to conceptualize race and what roles their gender and political identities play in these understandings.
If I had enjoyed the process enough, I could see this being a phenomenal PhD project. I was able to work with my advisor (a whiteness scholar) to uncover some gaping holes in the current literature about whiteness, race, and how we talk about race with white kids specifically. Surprisingly enough, a sample of 16 is not statistically significant and no true conclusions from my work can be extended or applied to broader society without further research.
My cohort and I jumped through all of the hoops for IRB approval and defended our work in front of a committee. It was a terrifying and demoralizing process but demonstrated what furthering our sociology studies would look like (and confirmed for most of us that a PhD is far from our dream). While my thesis didn’t have a direct tie to the LCD track that I studied, race is such an underlying factor in all law, crime, policy, and deviant research in America that I felt like I was building off of my studies in a different way. While this might not help me in my work in Bolivia, it will very directly impact any work that I do here in the states, especially working with other white people to pick up our share of the burden of inequality in America.
Throughout college I felt like my entire worldview was collapsing multiple different times. I wasn’t always open to reconsidering how I process tough concepts like race, class, economics and politics. This caused me to rely heavily on my friends and loads of ice cream to stay focused. In the second half of this semester alone, my thesis collapsed multiple times causing me to joke that after a year’s worth of work I would have to drop the program. I got behind in my grading as a TA and joked I would just give all of my students A’s. I botched my self care and joked I would just stay in bed for a week to make up for it. I forgot about an assignment and joked I would fail the class. I made a lot of jokes that didn’t feel like jokes, but every step of the way I had people around me with ice cream, hugs, music, and encouragement. I’m so thankful for all of the support I have had through the process.
You know you will be bombarded with more graduation pictures, more information on sociology, the LCD track, my thoughts on policy, and how my Spanish is doing, but know that I have always valued your support as well. I couldn’t have made it through college without your love and contributions to the ice cream/cookie dough funds. Please subscribe to the blog for more updates because now that I’ve finished college, it’s a summer of Bolivia prep before moving out! I will keep writing regularly now, but know that once I make the move the posts will become much less frequent. Until then, reach out to me! Let’s connect before we’re countries apart!
Updates:
- Time for more fundraising!
- Orientation in DC starts in 2 weeks!
- Past $1900 mark in fundraising!
- Tax deductible / recurring giving option (below)!
- I did NOT trip at graduation!
- I have continued contact with the Bolivia office and am excited to keep learning more about the work they are doing!
- Facebook page has continued to grow to help build a more engaging community through this process – my friends are excited to share more with you!
Prayer Requests:
- Strong final push for the GRE on Saturday
- That Hazel’s (my bunny) third date goes well and we can finalize her adoption
- For more funders and partners in this process
- Healthy mental/spiritual processing through more life transitions
- For my grandfather’s health (his cancer has come back aggressively in the last few months and his new treatment is draining)
Ways to Partner Financially:
