This month I will begin semester two of the Mitchell Scholar year. All continues to go well academically and professionally. I began working with the Northern Ireland Council for Ethnic Minorities (NICEM) last month and everyday I’m learning more about minority access to employment, housing, and the legal system in Northern Ireland. NICEM’s staff is dedicated and passionate about equal rights and justice for all people living in Northern Ireland. NICEM works in the following areas:
• Legislation and campaigning (promoting equality)
• Support to migrants
• Support to victims of harassment and discrimination
• Anti-racism training
• Capacity building (support the growth of the social economy)
Later this month, the Mitchell Scholars in the south will visit Belfast and we will spend five days with one another, meeting with community groups, journalists, and elected officials. We will also tour places like Giant’s Causeway and the various murals around the city. I’m looking forward to meeting with everyone again—it’s been a few months since we have all been together.
During the holidays I traveled to Poland, Germany, and England with friends and people from the program. This is one of the great benefits of the Mitchell year—the opportunity to explore different countries and build relationships with people from all over the world. We will all travel to Belgium in a couple months and most of us plan to visit a few other countries during spring break (Austria, France, Greece, and Spain are all potential options right now).
During the next few months I’m going to visit the countryside with some of my classmates from the north. There are so many beautiful areas in the north and the south that I will not have an opportunity to see them all, but I will try to make it to the Blarney Stone and Galway before my next blog post.