Lauren Croteau

At the end of last year, I was elected to be co-chair of our university’s Young Democratic

Socialists of America chapter. Having a new role of leadership has been both challenging and

exciting. I’ve learned a lot about organizing over the course of this year, and had the opportunity

to go to Chicago twice last summer to go to Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and DSA-

adjacent events. I had never really left the south until then, so those opportunities were

wonderful. The experience of being co-chair has been enriching and, although I haven’t been as

good about it this year as I plan to be next year, I want to do my best to impart leadership and

organizing skills in whoever is interested in learning. These skills can carry on beyond activism

on campus and can aid in community activism and life in general. I enjoy having added

responsibility but also the ability to delegate tasks and make sure others feel like they are

involved and contributing. We wrapped up the #TNisNotForSale campaign this year and won the

battle, but the war against labor rights on campus continued, and we were met with some failures

too. There was also the whole nazi propaganda problem on campus, an event we organized

around and had some success with I believe. I think the key to this sort of work is persistence,

even when it feels like the work you are doing gets reversed or undermined by bad things around

you.

I had more opportunities to travel when school began this year, as I was invited to speak

at the Winter YDSA conference and went to D.C. for the first time. Going to my first academic

conference was definitely a highlight for me. I feel like presenting my research to a group of

people made me look at it more thoroughly and the feedback others provided helped me organize

it better. I want to revise my research and expound on it because of the experience. Both trips to

D.C. required me to speak in front of a group of my peers whom I had never met, which gave me
some much needed public speaking experience. I got to be on public transportation for the first

time which was magical, and I loved going to museums and exploring D.C. Conversely, I’ve had

missed opportunities as far as travelling and academics go. I signed up for the marine biology

UHON course (I wanted to be a marine biologist as a kid and was pretty excited about it) but

ended up dropping it before spring semester started out of both financial anxiety and anxiety

about leaving the country for the first time. However, I’m going to try to have the financial

means and the mental energy to go to France next summer. I’ll have to figure out how much

scholarship money I can get, but I would love to get out of my comfort zone and study abroad for

a bit! Plus, according to my French professor, studying abroad can make it really easy to tack a

French minor onto your degree. Additionally, I applied for an internship for the first time this

summer. It was with the Nashville Central Labor Council and, although I didn’t get it, I’m glad I

applied and put myself out there.

Speaking on purely academics, it has been an influential and strange year. I learned a lot

about close reading poetry specifically and gained a newfound appreciation for poetry. I love

writing about it when I used to hate it. Additionally, the queer theory class I took in the fall has

radically influenced how I approach works of literature. I see a lot more connections in how

aspects of literature relate to and reinforce or undermine existing power structures outside of the

world of literature. The concept of queerness also means acknowledging others in works of

literature, even if those others are unseen and unspoken. Although theory is dense and hard to

understand sometimes, I definitely want to take more theory-related classes in the future. My

time management, although still lacking, has gotten a lot better. I have been able to more

consistently complete assignments ahead of time and have time to review them. I’ve kept my 4.0,

an accomplishment I’m happy about. Talking to professors this year about future plans has made
me more sure that I want to go to grad school, and I plan on talking to my professors this

upcoming year for more advice about that.