The world is a beautiful mess. It is fascinating yet can be terrifying; it is strangely synchronized yet can seem ready to split at the seams at any given moment. How could one not be mesmerized by it?

Personally, I have always been fascinated by the ‘bigger picture’ of the world, its people, its environment, and its politics. I spent the first 16 years of my life living in Germany, right in the beating heart of Europe, where driving a couple of hours in any given direction will inevitably take you into a different country with new and exciting things to see. This instilled a curiosity about the world in me that I carry and treasure to this day. When I moved to Canada with my family, my horizons broadened even more with the inclusion of the Canadian perspective. From a European perspective, Canada can seem almost insular, being separated from much of the rest of the world by two massive oceans. However, I soon came to realize that Canada is anything but insular, and that it very much has its place on the world stage. Wanting to learn more about world affairs, I soon found myself gearing up to start my university studies at UNBC, signed up for the Bachelor’s program in International Studies and Political Science.

So it was in the fall of 2004 that I found myself at the UNBC campus in Prince George. UNBC was the smallest university I considered in my research. However, being small does come with advantages. Class sizes are small (my biggest class had perhaps 100 students), professors are generally very accessible, and UNBC offers generous scholarship opportunities. Throughout my time in the INTS program, I learned not only about theory, but also the more practical implications of how everything in the world is connected, in most sectors and on most levels. I also learned that while the world is faced with a seemingly limitless array of issues, there are almost as many approaches to addressing these issues, and that although the approaches can seem incongruent, they may all have their individual merits.

After finishing my BA studies, I decided to remain with the INTS program and start a Master’s degree. For this program, I studied the greenhouse gas emissions of air travel in BC, and how they can be reduced. This, in turn, was somewhat of a pandora’s box, because no sooner had I finished my MA than I knew that there was so much additional research that could be done into transportation, a sector that is vital for society but also contributes significant greenhouse gas emissions.

I have recently defended my PhD in Natural Resources and Environmental Studies, researching the greenhouse gas emissions of all interurban transportation in BC, and how changes to the transportation system can help the province to achieve its legislated 2020 and 2050 emissions reduction targets. You may wonder what that has to do with INTS at UNBC, but to me, the answer is: a lot. The global climate is something that every person on Earth should be concerned about, and it requires solutions that are both global in outlook but local in being cognizant of individual context. As such, I feel that INTS has given me the basis to ground my knowledge and approaches in, as I now set out to do my part to reduce the impact of human activities on the climate, not only in BC but hopefully on a larger scale as well.