Hi everyone! I'm Julia from Seattle, WA. This blog was very influential during my college search, so I am excited to be writing to you all now! I'm majoring in Quantitative Social Science with a concentration in Geography and minoring in French and Religion. Outside of class, you can find me in Robinson Hall participating in various Dartmouth Outing Club sub-clubs, cooking in the Sustainable Living Center, or chatting with friends while waiting for my go-to Collis Cafe smoothie order. Talk soon!
Academic Program
QSS major; Religion and French double minor
Favorite Thing Right Now
Beautiful (and free) dinners at Moosilauke Ravine Lodge!
This class served as a great introduction to the Quantitative Social Science department. My favorite part of class was working with real-world data in our problem sets each week. I also adored my professor, Elsa Voytas. It was her first term as a professor here, and she was constantly eager to answer any questions you might have. I'm really looking forward to taking more QSS classes in the future!
I loved this class and especially my professor, Michele Tine. My favorite part of the course was watching the "Up!" documentary series as a class. The episodes began with a cohort of children at age 7, and has continued to follow them throughout their adulthood. We got to analyze the children's decisions and lifestyles in the context of what we were learning about, culminating with a paper highlighting one of the cohort members.
Paris and Literature and Film was the last part of my first-year writing experience. Professor Kane did a great job of bringing a variety of sources into our classroom discussions (books, movies, articles, etc.) which made the course very engaging. Plus, it was so much fun to learn about France before visiting in 25W!
Data Visualization was one of the best classes I've taken at Dartmouth so far. Professor Cooper was very engaging, and I learned that I really LOVE making data meaningful and accessible. I'm even taking Professor Cooper's Advanced Data Visualization in the winter to continue building on my skills.
Having never taken a Geography class before, I had no idea what to expect from Professor Alvarez León's course. By the end of the term, I was obsessed with all of the topics of the course. We spent the majority of the time talking about space versus place, and we constantly had fun group activities in class. Plus, I took the class with my godsister (a '28) which was a dream come true!
Evangelicalism was easily one of my favorite classes so far. Professor Balmer was an extraordinary lecturer, even providing anecdotes from his own PBS series about his book. I came into Dartmouth anxious about all of the reading that would be required for classes, and Evangelicalism quashed that fear of mine. I left the class a more confident and curious student.
After a great spring in Professor Balmer's Evangelicalism class, I decided to take a class he was offering in the summer. Religion in North America was such a joy because it connected so many themes I had explored in my other Religion classes: the spread of Christianity, the rapid growth of some North American traditions, and how all of these aspects have melded together to create the religious culture we see in our country today.
FallOn Campus and Seattle, WA
I split my time between campus and Seattle while conducting research with Professor Paul Musselwhite in the Department of History. I helped build a database that documented inventories on St. Kitt's in 1707 and, as it turns out, it is challenging to read old English in cursive!
I loved taking Climate Change and the Future of Agriculture with Professor Jonathan Winter! It was a hands-on class which was fun -- we even had a field experiment at the Life Sciences Center Greenhouse! This class really got me thinking about how to eat more sustainably (hint: the trick is to focus on legumes!).
Hello! I am finally settling into life here in Paris and I wanted to give you all a brief update on how I am doing.
I feel like I am developing my routines which is so cool. Honestly, the FSP is way less regimented (in a good way!) than I anticipated. We have countless excursions every week to see new parts of the city. This week, for instance, we are going to a play, a jazz show, and an art exhibit with our professors! We also have gotten many dinners together; each meal feels so meaningful and home-y.
I think that gets to the heart of what I love about this FSP: everything feels truly tailored to our small community. We take classes at Reid Hall which houses a lot of different study abroad programs for American universities, but all of our classes and excursions are with our small cohort. We are all extremely close with our professors and they almost feel like parental figures while we are so far from home.
Speaking of our professors, they are amazing scholars in their own right! Raphaël Sigal, our French Civilization professor, just published a book that had its own press circuit(!). I know that I said this in my last post but it remains true: it is wonderful to know that I am receiving a Dartmouth education no matter where I am in the world. And, as it turns out, a Dartmouth education means taking classes with truly exceptional teachers. I feel so lucky.
I am about to head off on my spring break to visit a Dartmouth '24 in Santander, Spain! He's teaching English in local schools here and I've been meaning to pay him a visit. It is cool to see what different types of people do after graduating. I'm getting ready for a 13 hour bus ride from Paris so wish me luck!
As my friends and I navigate complex feelings of nostalgia and excitement, we all have very different senior springs. Find out what I have been working on and what it has taught me!
This fall, I took INTS80.06: Multilateralism and US Leadership. The course was taught by visiting Professor DeLaurentis. We finished off the term with a trip to New York City to visit the UN and various UN Embassies.
