From ILC Alum Beilul Naizghi

Hello current ILC-ers!

I hope you are enjoying your winter break and you all hear good things come April!

My name is Beilul and I am currently a freshman at Brown University.

This past semester, I took Campaigns and Elections (with fellow ILC-er Andrew Gonzolas), Introduction to Public Policy, Contemporary Egypt in Revolution and The Digital World.  I elected to take the last two S/NC (pass/fail) which may not be for everyone but I highly recommend anyway. My class sizes included two 150-200 person lectures, a 20 person first year seminar and a 40 person introductory course. One important difference from high school was the sheer lack of assignments I had. One of my classes (Campaigns and Elections) consisted only of a midterm, a final and a 6-7 page, double spaced memo. Most of my weekly assignments were all readings and it was a bit intimidating to have so few opportunities to demonstrate that I new the material. In terms of my major, I had initially entered Brown with the intention of studying public policy but am now considering switching to development studies.

I am now a member of the Student Labor Alliance and the High Impact Network - a relatively new organization about effective altruism. I attended some of the Feminists at Brown and Brown for Financial Aid meetings but there were too many conflicts this semester. I also did some public opinion polling for the university's center for public policy.

This semester I spent a lot of time could attending lectures and presentations, some of which were about the programs offered at Brown and others were on topics I found interesting such as the effective altruism group 80,000 Hours, the Achebe Collloquim on African foreign policy and a United Students Against Sweatshops bootcamp in New Jersey. Some of the courses I want to take next semester include African Issues in Anthropological Perspective, Perspectives on Society, and Islam and Modernity but this will probably change in the next month.

Anyway, Happy New Year to everyone and please let me know if you have any questions about Brown :)

Beilul Naizghi

ILC Cornell - Hotel '10 & Columbia - Presidential Powers '11

Hercules High School c/o 2012

Brown University c/o 2016