My palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are ready. The rest of Eminem’s Lose Yourself plays in my head as I get ready to have my Skype meeting with the head of the program I’ve been placed with for the PCJ361 community engaged learning portion of the class. I know, I might seem a little melodramatic – but I can’t help being this nervous every time I try something new. I’m nervous about making good first impressions, about becoming a great placement student, about actually contributing to the program, and of course – as any student is, about getting a good grade in the class.

I’d contacted the head of my program ahead of this Skype meeting, with full confidence in my emails. She would have to think I had myself put together if I wrote using full coherent sentences and signed off using “Best,” right? She would definitely be impressed by the interest I had in her organization. And most of all, there was no way she would be able to tell how anxious I was about working with her – not after I would tell her about the similar organizations I’ve worked with in the past.

Little did she know, behind all the fancy words and bravado I put forth in the 3 paragraph email I sent to introduce myself, was a worried third-year student just trying to get her foot in the door.

We began our PCJ361 class this year by trying to decipher what it first meant to be “global,” then what it meant to be “local.” Through much debate and discussion with all my classmates, I’m still not too sure if we’d come to a final consensus. It’s difficult to define something so grand when all we could possibly understand is the Canadian and Westernized ideal of the rest of the world. In fact, all I’ve ever known was my middle-class home in suburbia. How could I possibly begin to understand how the world could be changed? Much less, how could I be the change that I wanted to see in the world, à la sensationalized and falsified quote from Gandhi?

I think this is what it means to “Think Globally, and Act Locally.” I’m realizing that it’s important to explore issues that occur on a macro-level, while not sensationalizing them as issues that were necessarily ours, but rather important to act on as a global citizen. On-the-ground solutions and education must be approached carefully to bridge the gap between the two paradigms. This is difficult, and as we learned – there are problematic tensions – but our placements are where we can address these tensions hands-on.

I was lucky enough to be placed with the Paradigm Shift Project, which “advance(s) education on important social and environmental justice issues through the production of short documentary films, educational materials, and outreach initiatives.” As a Peace, Conflict, and Justice student in the age of social media and digitized everything, this seems like it would be right up my alley.

I’m excited to help with their new spring initiatives in bringing the possibilities of an education centre for social and environmental change into fruition. I’m excited to be able to take global issues and help implement solutions on-the-ground and help relate them to a localized context. I’m putting the nervous parts of me aside in favour of this new, excited me – one that will, hopefully, be the change I want to see in the world.

Stay tuned for more updates on my class’ community engaged learning placements.