My name is Sam Jansen.
I'm a Junior here at Hope College studying
both political science and international studies
as well as a minor in Spanish.
Before I came to Hope I went to, I'm from
Grand Rapids, and went to a small high school
in Grand Rapids called Potters House, um actually,
at the Potters House there were over 30 different
countries represented with only 180 students
so I was really a minority in the high school
and I absolutely loved it.  I think, really,
to be honest that's where my love for different
cultures, uh just different languages, came
from and so when I came to Hope that was kind
of what spurred me onto International Studies.
I honestly don't think it was until after
my May term freshman year, at the end of
freshman year, that I realized like international
politics international studies, umm and relations
was something that I really had a passion
for. I did a May term with Professor Carlson
in the Kiniesiology department at the U.S.
Olympic
Training Center we were learning a bunch of
stuff about exercise science but we also learned
about uh how politics and sports
kind
of
connect.
After that I've had this constant uh burning desire
to see how not just sports but various ideas
and various groups of people interact on kind
of the international stage.
My most impactful internship that i've had
while I've been here at Hope is I did the Washington
D.C. Honors Semester where I was interning
with the U.S. Department of State.
I was with their Bureau of International Narcotics
and Law Enforcement, and so I was working with
their ILEA program and what their ILEA program
is is International Law Enforcement Academies.
And what they do is they work on building police
force capacity in developing countries around
the world.
During that internship I was doing budgeting,
fiscal policy. I was doing U.S. foreign policy.
I was writing briefings on that and having
to take such separate courses like the U.S.
foreign policy with Dr. Toppen or a Macroeconomics
course where I am not an economics major but
I had to take that course for the international
studies. It helped me in my internship. The
big thing that I took from that was international
studies is not just international but impacts
you here domestically as well, and you're interacting
with people from all different countries who
are here on business or here on student visas
who are here just working with your different
agencies.
So I just got back from Washington D.C. semester.
We took three classes while I was there with a Hope
professor who came down with us which I think
is really neat experience. So what we did was
we took classes there, we interned, and then we also
did interviews so kind of the most powerful
impact that semester had on me was the people
I met while I was there. I met under secretary
Tom Shannon, career diplomat John Bolton who is
an international security advisor. We met congressmen,
lawyers.
Having the ability to talk to these few people
and see where they came from and where they
think they're going and kind of how they got
there and any advice they had for me um was important,
and most of these were Hope grads.
To know that Hope prepared them very well
um for life after school.
I am also going to Quito, Ecuador in the fall
um I'm really excited to do that it's from
what I know we do a bunch of explorations
of kind of the area and field trips we go
to the Galapagos Islands, we go to the Amazon
rainforest for a week.
I'm going to be doing a homestay with a family.
When you're in a homestay you really don't
know what you're getting into but you are
completely immersed in the culture. You are
completely immersed in the language and I
think that's really important.
I'm also really excited to have the freedom
on breaks to go to other countries in South
America. I would really like to go to Cusco
and like Lima, Peru and the Nazca lines in
Peru maybe even umm like Brazil or Argentina with the
Study Abroad program and I think that's an
important staple of the major because you're
not on Hope's campus and what they've taught
you at Hope you can put and apply in real
life, and I think that's really key.
