December 12th, 2025
My understanding of the future of global change has been shaped by my 3 semester experience participating in the Scholars program. Compared to the experience I would have had if I were not in the Scholars program, I believe that I would not think as critically about how our actions as humanity affect the world, let alone the solutions we need to pick up the pieces from that.
I feel like since being in the SGC program, I have noticed many examples of failures of critical thinking in my day-to-day life. One example of this is that a lot of people seem to think that solar panels are an “end all be all” solution to clean energy. While it is true that solar panels are a great solution for energy generation without emitting harmful gasses into the atmosphere, it is not a fully sustainable solution to clean energy for everyone. Solar only works at its best on very sunny days, because the energy generated in the solar photovoltaic system can produce a lot of energy, but it is not easily stored. This makes solar a lot more expensive than people originally think, since the setup costs and maintenance tend to be higher. Solar panels also take up a lot of space, and while on top of houses is a good solution for this, people don’t always like the way they look. I just think that everyone’s minds always jump to solar panels as a good, green solution for the large modern consumption of energy. This proves to be a lack of critical thinking because there are too many caveats that come with that blanket statement.
This colloquium taught me about the negative aspects of climate change on the planet and the societal behaviors that make it hard to fix that. It also taught me about the difficult tradeoffs that need to be made by policy makers to do their best to have a positive impact on society in hopes that we can band together to save our planet. I believe that the SGC colloquium curriculum has shaped my college experience, especially in helping me have a better attitude and approach towards my major. I have always had a passion for science, but being surrounded by those with similar interests as me helped to fortify that immensely. I was originally going to study the ecology and evolution track of biological sciences, but being in the colloquium honestly gave me the freedom to broaden my horizons, and focus on the rest of biology that I have grown to love. I could expand my knowledge on the environment through my colloquium, and learn about biology on a microscopic/cellular level in my other class repertoire. Along with the colloquium, I was also advised to take a few supporting courses within the curriculum. I chose to take a class titled “The Chesapeake Bay Ecosystem: Intersection of Science, Economics, and Policy”, which further enriched my love for the environment while also tying it into concepts of economics and policy. I believe this course prepared me well for the future of the rest of my life. I also took a class my first semester, titled “Principles of Ecology and Evolution” which fueled my fascination with ecological ideas. This class is a natural science requirement, which I take many types of due to my choice of major. This also counted for an SGC supporting course, and I believe it went very well with the topics explained throughout the course of the colloquium.
I believe that the living-learning community was a tremendous benefit to my experience in the program. I thought that it was very convenient last year when I lived in Centreville Hall and was able to attend my colloquium lecture just two minutes away from where I lived in the CCC! I liked when it was time for class and everyone in my section would be on their way too. Everyone in the elevators all chatted about our next class together. I just thought it was a cool way to build community with a large class in college, which is something you don’t usually see in college lectures with over 100 people.
My excursion this semester was a campus cleanup and beautification session through the UMD Arboretum and Botanical gardens. There we re-mulched some tree/bush beds outside of Symons hall, and pulled weeds out from under the bushes to make the area look much nicer along with removing invasive species. I believe that the excursions were a great way to get me out into the field and completing service projects that truly better the environment. I loved how I felt after the job was done, especially since I had the help of many fellow Scholars by my side! Without this program, I don’t think people would be as motivated to complete community service projects such as this one, and even though we should always be motivated to help out our community, I believe this program has positive impacts on our attitudes towards service.
Like I said before, Scholars has put me into contact with a lot of like-minded people such as my classmates and professors. I don’t know if I have necessarily encountered a challenge in any of my beliefs throughout this program, but I will say that I have definitely changed my outlook in certain elements discussed in the course. For example, we talked about the methods of Drawdown a lot this semester, and I believe that opened my eyes to a lot of things behind-the-scenes of climate change issues. The simulations we did in class showed me the types of decisions that governments need to make in the face of climate change. My given hypothetical country was an underdeveloped island nation, so things like geothermal energy were very accessible to me, but space travel was not. These are the types of tradeoffs that governments have to make in real life, and I believe that was something that changed my point of view from before being a Scholar.
I believe that Scholars will help me navigate the rest of my university career, and beyond! I have become a healthy skeptic and great critical thinker, and have applied science to many aspects of my daily life. I feel that I will always use my knowledge that I have received about climate change, since the issue is prevalent and will continue to worsen as I get older. I will always be an advocate for change in the environments I find myself in, and will try my best to inform those around me of ways we can help.