At first I believed this class might be boring. There’s only so much one can learn about immigration, or so I thought. What we did in this course definitely proved me wrong. The subject matter was made interesting with hands-on learning via projects and walking tours.
My favorite project was the interview with an immigrant. At first I couldn’t think of anyone but thankfully a good friend reminded me that she was a South Korean immigrant and agreed to let me interview her. Thanks to the interview project, I was able to understand her a bit better, why her family moved here, and why she’s so intent on returning one day.
My personal essay was the hardest to write. It was difficult learning about my family. Neither of my parents quite know their family history, they never bothered to ask their parents. However, what little information they did know interested me quite a bit, such as how my family decided to get into America by going through Canada.
The statistical profile was not my favorite project but it wasn’t the hardest. The one part about it that I enjoyed was making graphs on Excel. If nothing else, that’s the one thing my parents drilled into me. The hardest part was finding out why my immigrant group made their way up to New York City. There seemed to be very little information to be found on this.
It was not only just the projects, but also the readings as well that gave an insight into the lives of people I’d never really thought about before. Immigrants make up New York City, they make up our country and this is, without a doubt, a topic people need to be aware of.
