Meet Our NSR Student Editors — Molly Enich, Social Media Editor. The North Star Reports: Global Citizenship and Digital Literacy, at NorthStarReports.org and facebook.com/NorthStarReports

Meet Our NSR Student Editors — Molly Enich, Social Media Editor. The North Star Reports: Global Citizenship and Digital Literacy, at NorthStarReports.org and facebook.com/NorthStarReports

[Me hiking the eastern coast of Iceland]

I grew up in Side Lake, Minnesota, a very small community on a chain of lakes, up on the Iron Range of northern Minnesota. Some of my earliest memories are spending time at my cabin in Ontario, hunting with my dad, and fishing with family. I’ve always enjoyed being outside, and honestly, there isn’t much else to do in northern Minnesota except spend time outdoors. During the long Minnesota winters, my family goes snowmobiling, ice fishing, and downhill skiing.

Since I was 3 years old, I have had a love for skiing, and I’ve spent every winter downhill skiing ever since. I loved it so much when I was younger that I needed a leash attached to my jacket because I would ski down the hill too fast. My love for skiing continued to grow as I got older, and when I turned 15, my passion for helping others and skiing met. I decided to become a volunteer ski patrol at Giants Ridge Ski Resort in Biwabik, Minnesota. A ski patrol is a first responder on skis that helps injured skiers and snowboarders. The training consisted of skills ranging from how to care for a broken arm to how to treat frostbite. Ultimately, the training lasted about a year and a half.

[My mom, sister, me, and my dad in Costa Rica]

I fell in love with being a ski patrol, so I began thinking about doing something similar for my career. I thought about nursing, and I realized it would be a great fit for me. In the fall of 2015, I was accepted into the nursing program at St. Scholastica. Although it has only been one semester of nursing classes, it has been a great learning experience in which I can apply my knowledge of being a ski patrol to material we have learned in class. I will be a junior in the fall of 2016, and I am expected to graduate with a biology minor in the spring of 2018.

Another quality that makes me who I am is my love for travel. My mom was a travel agent when she was younger, so she instilled a love of travel in me at a very young age. From Paris to Hawaii to Iceland, my family has been all over to soak up the local culture and learn from our experiences. Something I love about travelling is how it familiarizes you with the world. Because I have been lucky enough to travel, I am more aware of global issues, cultures, and norms around the world. It is possible to read about the cultures of some countries, but until you are immersed in that lifestyle, it is hard to get a grasp of why people are the way they are.

One of the main reasons I am a writer for the North Star Reports is because I want to share my views with the world. Whether those views come from me travelling to the Mediterranean or spending the summer at home on the Iron Range, they are important to help people understand the variation of cultures found around the world. As I wrote in my previous article, the economy of the Iron Range revolves around the mines. People who are not from the Iron Range do not usually understand this concept, so I want to write about the economic issues that cannot be swept under the rug. This is just one example of how I can share my experiences and observations of the world with others. The North Star Reports has given me the opportunity to share different ideas and views, both of which I am excited to share in the future.
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Please contact Professor Liang if you wish to write for The North Star Reports — HLIANG (at) css.edu

See also, our Facebook page with curated news articles at http://www.facebook.com/NorthStarReports
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The North Star Reports: Global Citizenship and Digital Literacy (http://NorthStarReports.org) is a student edited and student authored open access publication centered around the themes of global and historical connections. Our abiding philosophy is that those of us who are fortunate enough to receive an education and to travel our planet are ethically bound to share our knowledge with those who cannot afford to do so. Therefore, creating virtual and actual communities of learning between college and K-12 classes are integral to our mission. In five semesters we have published 200 articles covering all habitable continents and a variety of topics ranging from history and politics, food and popular culture, to global inequities to complex identities. These articles are read by K-12 and college students. Our student editors and writers come from all parts of the campus, from Nursing to Biology, Physical Therapy to Business, and remarkably, many of our student editors and writers have long graduated from college. We also have writers and editors from other colleges and universities. In addition to our main site, we also curate a Facebook page dedicated to annotated news articles selected by our student editors (http://www.facebook.com/NorthStarReports). This is done by an all volunteer staff. We have a frugal cash budget, and we donate much of our time and talent to this project. We are sponsored by St. Scholastica’s Department of History and Politics and by the scholarly Middle Ground Journal: World History and Global Studies (http://theMiddleGroundJournal.org).

For a brief summary, please see the American Historical Association’s Perspectives on History, at: http://www.historians.org/perspectives/issues/2013/1305/Opening-The-Middle-Ground-Journal.cfm

Hong-Ming Liang, Ph.D., Editor-in-Chief and Publisher, The North Star Reports; Chief Editor, The Middle Ground Journal; Associate Professor of History and Politics, The College of St. Scholastica.

Kathryn Marquis Hirsch, Managing Editor, The North Star Reports.

(c) 2012-present The North Star Reports: Global Citizenship and Digital Literacy http://NorthStarReports.org ISSN: 2377-908X The NSR is sponsored and published by Professor Hong-Ming Liang, NSR Student Editors and Writers, The Department of History and Politics of The College of St. Scholastica, and the scholarly Middle Ground Journal. See Masthead for our not-for-profit educational open- access policy. K-12 teachers, if you are using these reports for your classes, please contact editor-in-chief Professor Liang at HLIANG (at) css.edu