Role playing activities, workshops and discussions to help students own the UWC mission
The United World Colleges could be defined as places where people from every corner of the world come together in an atmosphere of peace and dialogue, fostering intercultural communication. While this definition holds true, it would be a mistake to believe that such a favourable environment emerges spontaneously and is easy to achieve. One must bear in mind that every year, new students join UWC schools and colleges, each with different experiences and often just theoretical knowledge of what it means to be part of the UWC movement. To bridge the gap between theory and practice, it is crucial to work alongside students so that the UWC values may become a personal compass guiding individual actions.
Such is the context in which Critical Engagement (CE) was conceived, an experiential learning methodology aimed at developing critical thinking, personal engagement, and strengthening community ties. The programme is administered as a three-day workshop where first-year students are guided by a team of facilitators through activities of discussion and role playing. We asked Janica Kozina – a former student of Duino and a CE facilitator – to tell us more about these activities.
As Janica illustrated, these themes can be very abstract and not immediately clear to our students.
Reflecting on her time as a student in Duino, Janica remembers it as a rather intense period, where it wasn’t always easy to focus on every input and lesson she was confronted with at the College. It is therefore very important to find spaces for discussion like these, where students challenge themselves in a protected and non-judgmental environment.
The CE workshop entailed three challenging days for the students but they also found the activities very engaging.
She grew up in Athens, Greece. Graduated from UWC Maastricht in 2018 and then went on to study and live in Scotland, where she helped manage a small second-hand bookshop. She is currently a history researcher based in Florence and working on the history of emotions, gender, and sexuality in the European Left. She loves literature in translation and vegan baking.
Born, raised and living in Latvian countryside. Graduated UWC Adriatic in 2009 and obtained bachelor’s degree in Scotland in 2013. She founded an international summer course in Latvia in 2010 and has been working in the experiential and nature education ever since, once in a while mixing it with baking and cooking jobs.
It all led her to join the Critical Engagement (CE) team in 2015 where she’s been facilitating and coordinating in different UWC colleges. In between, Laura spent two years working as a Personal development coach on all wooden Spanish tall-ship sailing around the Mediterranean, Black Sea, North Sea and twice crossing the Atlantic ocean.
Currently she spends her days re-learning life with her two sons, playing flute in a local amateur orchestra and being behind most CE’s actions, but still a sailor and baker in heart dreaming of crossing the ocean again and early mornings in a bakery.
From Cardiff, Wales. UWC Atlantic graduate, Class of 2008. Studied undergraduate distance learning with the Open University. Worked for Save the children developing and delivering projects on children and young people’s rights, specifically, article 12, the right to have a say on decisions which impact you. Set up a street food business and have worked in the local food movement and festival scene for 10 years.
Critical engagement member since 2015! Love it!
More recently work supporting refugees and asylum seekers in south wales. Brand new dad! Travel, beer and cheese enthusiast.
Comes from Medjugorje, BiH. Janica is formally educated in psychology and political science in the USA. Her professional work centres around education, project management and empirical research. All these are reflective of her devotion to neuropsychology and scientifically-sound ways of enhancing the equality of opportunity.
For Janica, the cornerstone of CE is cultivation of intellectual humility. Undoubtedly a challenging process but one that enables meaning-making to be a deliberate, humane and exploratory prospect.
The excitement is certainly high. Janica loves all things water, including sea and rain, with coffee topping both. As someone who grows attached to places, it is good to finally be back in the kitchen where she started cooking ideas in the first place.
She grew up in North-western Italy in quite a rural context surrounded by a large family. She went to UWC Ad (‘07-’09) where she started drawing and painting. She then worked various jobs before leaving in 2011 to the USA where she graduated in Fine Arts. She’s currently studying to finish her MFA in Visual arts. She’s been working in the field of education and for associations that offer empowerment through art and performance.
She’s always been sensitive on the subject of workers’ rights and has been volunteering with one of the biggest Italian Unions since 2017, especially to improve women freelancers working conditions. She loves coffee but cannot drink any, because her head is already going a thousand miles an hour, but to unwind she rides her MTB or goes to friends’ garage concerts.
I look forward to learning from everybody at this CE course!
