This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at DePauw chapter.
Meet this week’s Her Campus Celebrity, Kate Porfilio! Kate is a senior Peace and Conflict Studies major from Raleigh, North Carolina. She sat down with Her Campus DePauw to share a little bit about her senior year.
Her Campus: Hi Kate, thanks for taking the time to let me interview you today. Tell me about what you’re involved in on campus.
Campus Celebrity: Okay, let’s go down the list. I am a First Year RA on Hogate 4. I am also Co-President of Restorative Justice Mediation. I am the secretary for Student Government. I am involved with the Global Partners Program and I am a Compton Center for Peace and Justice Intern. I think that covers all of them, but there might be some I’m leaving some out.
HC: Wow, I can see why you might forget some! That’s a lot of great positions to hold. How did you get involved with the Compton Center?
CC: Compton was something I first heard about from a friend who was an intern and I think it was also pointed out to me by my advisor because its something that a lot of Conflict Studies people see their interests line up with. So yeah, it was something that they said I should take a look at and see if the program fit for me. I applied at the end of my sophomore year. I got the job and started as soon as I got back from studying abroad junior year.
HC: Awesome, what are you doing as an intern?
CC: Each semester, students plan a project that suits their interests and their passions in terms of social justice. So right now I am working on my Honor Scholar thesis on GMOs and agriculture in the United States and I’m going to be planning a project with a panel and potentially a documentary being shown as well, about food injustice in the United States, specifically revolving around GMOs. Last year, I did a project kind of like Humans of New York, but with DePauw faces. Trying to put up some faces that students didn’t know; faces that student should know. We talked to some of the librarians, we talked to Larry Ligget that goes around and takes pictures of everyone at campus events. That kind of thing.
HC: That sounds really neat. So, as a senior, do you have any advice for younger students?
CC: Well I’m sure I do, but it’s not something I usually dispense at random. It’s more if there are questions about things. One thing I will say is my freshman year I did not take advantage of stuff as much as I should’ve, could’ve, or want to now. There’s so much that I’m involved in now that I wish I had more time to work on, or that I wish I had more time to devote to. If I had gotten involved in this stuff as a first-year I would have had another whole year to spend working with these organizations and seeing how I can connect with different parts of the campus community.
HC: I know it’s still pretty early in the semester, but what are you going to miss most about DePauw?
CC: I think it’s the way that everything is connected. It’s a small enough campus that I can be involved in so many things, but I also have the academic and social components as well. I feel like once I leave DePauw there isn’t that same centralization of everything; my academics, how I spend my day, what organizations I want to get involved with, as well as having my friends live just down the hallway. You don’t have that close of a community where everything comes together like that anymore, so I’m going to miss that a lot.
HC: I bet that will be a big change. Do you have any plans for life after DePauw?
CC: After DePauw, I would love love love to get a Fulbright. Right now I’m applying for one in which I would get a one year Masters program in International Social Policy at the University of Kent. If that doesn’t come through—fingers crossed it does—I would be really interested in working somewhere in Washington D.C. with perhaps a member of Congress or somewhere in a think tank. That’s what I’m going to start looking at once I’m done with my Fulbright app.
HC: Very cool! Okay, last question. Do you have any goals you want to accomplish before graduation, fun or serious?
CC: Well, I think my biggest goals will be tackling and finishing my two theses. More of the fun goals are just finding the times in between things that are going to be the memories that stick with me, whether that’s playing Cards Against Humanity and talking with people until four in the morning, or those moments when you run into someone on campus and you end talking for an hour when you were just walking to the library. I want to have more of those moments.
HC: Those sound like great goals to have. Well, thank you again and good luck with all of your projects. Enjoy your senior year!
CC: Thank you!