When I first heard of this 360 and the topic, I got so excited and could not wait to be apart of it even if we were not traveling outside of the country like the other 360 classes did. Once the classes began I realized it was going to be an intense semester because I realized how many different point of views everyone had and I noticed this huge learning gap between my peers and I. I really found the “tension” we had in class at the beginning to be really interested. Even though I am aware that I have experienced these learning gaps between my peers and I in other class, it was really different in our 360. This was the first time I had conversations about it in class with my classmates. When it came to speaking of these issues I would usually just vent with my friends outside of classes. I really loved the fact that as the semester continued, we became more and more willing, or able to, speak of these privileges with one another. This has been an experience that I will never forget, I really loved the fact that the professors became so willing to give us the space to work on an activist project as part of the class.

Initially when I was discussing writing my reflection with Anne, she suggested that I write one for both the 360 and Ecological Imaginings because so many of my connections in both classes were deeply intertwined with one another. I ultimately decided against this because I wanted to give both classes distance from one another because there are many ways in which I also see the points at which they do not intersect. However, it was not until I was looking over my posts on Serendip to do my reflections that I could really visually see the ways in which the 360 course cluster and my Ecolit class overlapped. Many of my connections to Ecological Imaginings were finding the ways in which the Environment movement is racially and class exclusive, something I had never realized or encountered before. My concept of the way nature affects people significantly influenced how I perceived the Prison environment. One of the other connections I began to make toward the end of the course was between Jody’s education course and Ecolit revolved around divergent thinking and “play.” I began to wonder if the ways in which we are taught to focus in school, and filter out divergent thoughts was not ecologically friendly because we are taught to filter out of the “distracting” environment as well.

I have been an active listener, and an average comment-maker. I have been actively working on talking more in class though, without being too careful about whether what I had to say was "good enough."

On-line, I got really into my site-sit responses. Out-of-doors in our excursions I was very excited to be part of the activities. In-class, I could have worked more on having points to make, but did try to comment building off of other people's points and bring another perspective into use.

The site-sit experiments were very personal, as were my ways of approaching them. But after class, a friend and I would always dissect what had gone on in class and we would talk about postings on Serendip. Some of these conversations might have been mentioned once or twice in a post, but could have been mentioned more. 

I hoped, especially in my Web Papers, to contribute by choosing different topics, especially in Web Paper 3 my wish was to expose to poetry in a differing cultural context. I wanted to bring a part of South Asia into the very (and perhaps understandably, since its what we know best?) U.S. based discussion.

This semester is about to end, but I’ve really loved taking my classes. It is still hard to believe that I’m in college, not to mention the fact that I have just finished a college semester. Ecological Imaginings has certainly gotten me up to speed on ecology, and importantly, the ecology of college. While not everything in the class has dramatically changed my life, my perceptions of college and of ecology have changed, and I have been pleasantly surprised by a lot of the course material.

            The two units of the class that have really changed my outlook are the ecofeminism and the ecocritique units. Both of them have made me a lot more critical of how I view the environment and how I think about how humans interact with the environment and what we could be doing better. The ecofeminism unit has also been making me think even more about how women are treated in our society, and the connections between women and the environment, especially the similarities between how women and the environment are treated. In between all of our very clearly environmentally-related work, I really enjoyed reading Fun Home, and because it wasn’t like anything else that we read in class, the discoveries I made about it and how ecological the book is impacted me even more.

Hira Ismail

Final Web Paper # 4

Hello, everyone! I posted my thoughts on my portion of a teach-in here: /exchange/song-ourselves but comments don't have a picture uploading option, and I was having some troubles "copying" my photos. Thus, here they are now!

My experience in this class this semester was very interesting. I was constantly comparing my experience in the class with Sara Gladwin's, who felt entirely different about the course than I did. To me, I felt as if all the class members were getting incredibly close. This was my smallest class this semester- by about two or three people. Maybe because of this, I felt as if I got to know everyone incredibly well, more than I did for any of my other courses. Yet I know Sara felt as if she didn't know anyone, which was frustrating for me. I kept wishing she could appreciate the closeness I felt to the other class members. But I also completely understood where she was coming from. That didn't stop my experience from being tinged by her experience, though, just as I'm sure my experience effected hers.

As for the readings, I often felt as if the class discussion totally changed my entire perception of the text. I would often read articles on my own and feel and feel completley fine with them- I agreed with the author's statements, I understood what they were saying. I had little critique. But then I would come to class and during the discussion, somehow find problems I hadn't picked up on. Or, I would become frustrated that we were just reiterating the same arguments over and over again. I guess part of my frustration was good- it means I was critically thinking about the text. But sometimes discussing the same issues repeatedly tested my limits. I particularly felt this with Terry Tempest WIlliam's work, for some reason.