My group did our action project on the topic of trade. We were originally going to conduct a faculty panel, but about a week after we’d decided on this it was announced that a faculty panel on the topic of trade was going to be hosted by the University. We then decided that we would just have grad students and representatives from different organizations speak. Then we encountered difficulties in trying to acquire a room. We were able to come to the conclusion that a podcast would be aa better course of action.
We had two speakers on our podcast. One of which was Joseph Maurey, the University of Washington Coffee Education Head, and the other Stan Sorscher, the president of the board of the Washinton Fair Trade Coalition. Both of them brought unique perspectives to our discussion of trade. Every topic related in some way to material from class.
Right away Joseph’s discussion of the coffee trade could be related to what we learned about the exploitation of farmers, as well as our learning about oil in transportation. Stan was able to speak to the regulation of world trade and globalization. This could be related to our learning of the WTO, as well as the differences in national perspectives, like risk culture.
It was very interesting to hear what Stan and Joseph had to say because they were able to go into depth and add a lot to topics we’d touched on in class. I highly encourage you all to go listen to our podcast.
In the end, our group project went rather smoothly. My group kept in good communication, and we were all willing to make time to meet and pick up tasks. The group action project is a good stretch project, in the way that you have to think creatively and work as a group. I found myself feeling responsible for the partial success of our project so I didn’t procrastinate as I usually would have, but rather completed my tasks promptly. Overall, I would say my experience with the group project was as good as it could have been.