Global Perspectives
Participating Orgs in the First Pangea Showcase:
Starting in the UMBC STRiVE Leadership retreat; a small interclass diverse team and I began the Cultural Events Board (CEB) a non-official student org which served as a board under student life (learning objective: working in diverse teams). Their purpose was to serve cross-cultural exchanged. This coalesced into an annual event called Pangea which is a cultural showcase. This satisfies the global perspectives component of GCSP as a gold as Aakash has worked on the project for two years.
Pangea's Setup includes 19 organizations participating. Fourteen of them participated through performances and most did tabling to promote their organizations (learning objective: openness to differences). The first annual Pangea occurred on September 9th, 2016. It took eight months of relationship building and the team faced multiple obstacles including leadership opposition in UMBC as well as other organizations trying to take over our event. In the end, this is a legacy that will continue under student life as Pangea has been established as a yearly event. Its purpose - to build tolerance at UMBC and expose freshman to the breadth of people they will share this campus with and the greater environment (learning objective: global citizenship).
This team was one of the best I worked with in my undergraduate career. We had a vision and kept that vision in mind even when it seemed impossible. How could a group of students possibly get so many people in one place? Once we got backing from Student Life on campus (Janae Cruz and Jen Dress), we could better approach the university with this event. The other interesting problem was getting organizations to commit to an event that no one else yet committed to as we were always asked who else would be there. It felt fantastic to see the event unfold and go so well!
To engineer tools for scientific discovery, a multi-dimensional view is almost required as more and more industries synergize their companies by making cross-cultural partnerships. CERN with the large hadron collider is a perfect example of many countries and cultures working together to discover/prove fundamental physics principles. This project started in STRIVE and took approximately 3 hours of work per week for 8 months and meetings/tasks done once a week for the next year as well. Through PANGEA I learned that it helps to have developed good relationships with people in administration because at the end of the day they are the ones who says what can and can’t go. Additionally, I learned how to focus a team to develop a new idea and ensure we stayed on track to accomplish what we wanted. Transferring an idea is very difficult and requires a great deal of thought to explore what can actually be effective. I broadened my perspective in the sense that I learned to work with an array of people outside of STEM which was an adjustment as I hadn’t really done that before.
Integrity – Throughout the process of creating first CEB then PANGEA, we had to tussle with the idea of which people would receive credit. In the end, our goal was to educate, enlighten, and build solidarity. We didn’t need our names/CEB to be heavily plugged through the event so we stayed in the background and ensured that the cultural groups received the credit and we were portrayed as simple facilitators.
Perspectivism – In creating PANGEA we had to acknowledge that there are groups on campus whose purpose is to bring together people who are similar to them and they do not necessarily feel an obligation to share their culture with others (learning objective: cultural awareness). By understanding this we could better approach groups in the most appropriate way for said group to participate in PANGEA.
Realistic vision – Our end goal is to eliminate hate attributed to cultural differences and general ignorance of others practices at UMBC. This goal is difficult to measure and then decide if it can be reduced. PANGEA is a realistic extension of that goal to be accomplished. We had to be reasonable with how many events we wanted to create as well and what we could get the most number of groups to be involved in and show the student body solidarity through the groups.
Teamwork – The CEB team is one of the best set of people I have worked with. We all have very strong opinions of what we want to see in the event but understand the ultimate goal of better educating and immersing students in cross-cultural perspectives.
Persistence – Throughout the process of forming the Cultural Events Board and then PANGEA we faced obstacles from UMBC officials and other student groups who wanted to change our event or postponed it. We were even told we should make a 10-year plan as people didn’t think we could get all the cultural groups together in one place to make PANGEA happen. It was a fantastic feeling to be able to get what we wanted done in eight months and do so successfully that we could establish it as a UMBC sponsored event.
Flexibility – We had certain objectives such as being part of welcome week so that we could target freshman specifically and educate them on the cultural groups on campus, however, in the end, we had to compromise and have it after welcome week so we could still attain funding but not crowd in on the welcome week activities already planned. Compromise was key and so was flexibility
A global perspectives specific learning objective includes situational awareness. We were able to support the different cultural groups on campus and give them a platform to voice opinions through PANGEA but also a monthly town hall meeting to discuss what their organizations lack and what grievances they may have with student life, SGA, or other administration. Additionally, their feedback helped feed into PANGEA II to help improve the entire event.