Scott Debrecht is part of the first group of Honors students to participate in the World Scholars Program this year. The World Scholars Program allows first year students to go abroad for their entire first semester. Scott chose to go to Rome, Italy.
When I first learned that we had to take a mandatory World Politics class as part of our program here at John Cabot University, I wasn’t too excited. Frankly, I thought that forcing us to take a certain class was kind of silly, seeing as how we were all in international related majors in the first place. However, the first couple of classes put my doubts to ease. Professor Driessen is one of the best teachers I’ve had; he is smart, relatable, enjoyable to listen to, and clearly is enthusiastic about his field of study. Because of this, the material became much more interesting. It is one of the classes that I look forward to going to, even with the additional Honors assignments outside the standard curriculum. Each assignment helps me to understand what we learn in class and to come at all kinds of issues from a new perspective. And even though the class is Honors, it really isn’t that much more work or time than any of my other classes and it has taught me on a much more in-depth level. My knowledge of world events and the nuances of political science has grown so much from this class, while at the same time being enjoyable, and I know my fellow Honors students feel the same. At the time I am writing this, our presentation on the European Union’s view of the American Presidential election is just about a week away, and I know we’ll be working hard to teach the subject to the rest of our classmates. Even if the program were to make this class voluntary, I would still recommend it to all freshman in the World Scholars Program.
