Kimberly Casimir
Kimberly Casimir spent a month of her summer in Shanghai, China the second most populated city in China. During her time there, she studied at East China Normal University known for being one of the most prestigious universities in China, where she was involved in a program that focused on the Business and Culture side of China. She took two rigorous classes on the Chinese language and the political development of China. Through her time there, she learned how to live as a regular Chinese native, she had interaction with residents 24/7. She had to learn public transportation, be able to take care of herself in a new environment and speak the language to communicate. Through Kimberly’s time there, she learned to be more independent which was one of her goals, and gain new friendships that she can keep for a lifetime. She saw things that really opened her eyes to the reality that this world has so much to offer. She was able to walk on the Great Wall of China and see amazing things that she only read about in her history textbooks; it was truly amazing. She learned that the only way to truly experience what this world has to offer, you need to find within yourself to take initiatives like saving for a trip to a new place or just read about different countries. One thing I learned is that China has 5,000 years worth of history, whereas America has only 250. China is very proud of that fact. It made her realize that this world has a lot of things that she has not yet discovered.
CEE Title: Politics Around the World
This CEE was an incredible experience to endure and I truly believe that we taught a lot to the people that joined us for that special afternoon. We wanted our guests to have credible and necessary knowledge on the political structures of not only our countries but also the US. We tested our guests and had deep discussions. We really wanted to dig deep on the voting process, and why it is so important. Voting is a crucial right that we need to take advantage, our votes count and we do not realize until it’s to late. Voting is something that we wanted to also focus on, because it allowed us to show why other countries do not get to vote like China. I loved our presentation. Having a guest speaker really put us out there because we had a real professional that knew this information from the back of there hand. Leading a event with guest that had a lot of curiosity of what is event was truly about, a real awakening. We wanted to teach them, and take off that ethnocentric hat for a minute and really listened to what we had to say, and I believed they did. At the end of it all I was happy.