Reflective Essay

Paul Tripeny

11/11/20

Even before I came to Hamline, I knew I wanted to help people. In preschool, I wanted to become a firefighter. When in elementary school, I had a vast number of barely connected interests, and didn’t know how to connect them in a way that I could use to help people. Then, I watched the first episode of the TV show NCIS, and was utterly smitten with the character Abby Sciuto. From that day forward, I knew I wanted to be a forensic scientist. Everything I learned about forensic science was fascinating, and best of all, would allow me to help people. Then, after spending three years struggling and failing at a Chemistry major, I realized I just wasn’t cut out for it, and changed my major to Social Justice. Today, I’m glad I did.

There was a lot more than just my desire to help others that influenced my decision to major in Social Justice. When I was in kindergarten, my family began to foster children. Being five, I was convinced I could order a child and asked for “a brown, baby boy” even after the woman from the foster agency told me she couldn’t guarantee I would get what I wanted. Well, I got that brown, baby boy, and when the woman from the foster agency asked me what I wanted next, I told her, “You brought me a brown, baby boy. Whatever.” In all, my family fostered nine children, and adopted three boys, two black, and one white. When they officially became my little brothers, my mission in life changed. I no longer just wanted to help people in general. I wanted to make the world a better place for my little brothers.

All of my little brothers have Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder. Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, or FASD for short, is the name given to a collection of disorders, both physical and mental, caused by the parent drinking alcohol while pregnant. The symptoms can vary wildly, and can include almost any number of mental health issues and physical disabilities. My little brothers cover a wide and interesting array of both. When I first learned about this, I was infuriated. Who would do this to my little brothers? But with time, I’ve learned that it isn’t that simple, and never has been. So I’ve taken that anger, and channeled it in more productive directions. A report by the American Psychology Association found “64 percent of jail inmates, 54 percent of state prisoners, and 45 percent of federal prisoners reporting mental health concerns.” Combine this with the attention the death of Trayvon Martin and the subsequent Black Lives Matter movement brought to the institutional racism built into the American Justice System, and it slowly becomes obvious why it was inevitable I became a Social Justice major.

When I first came to Hamline, I moved into the LGBTQIA+ and Social Justice section of Drew Hall. It was there that I met my two best friends, a gay, trans man, and an asexual, gender neutral person. Through them, I was introduced to Spectrum, the club for LGBTQIA+ people to meet and hang out. Through the connections I made there, I learned so much about what it means to be on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, and eventually realized that I am demi- and bisexual. This means that I need to form a close relationship with someone before I am sexually attracted to them, but once that relationship is formed, their gender doesn’t matter to me.

In my actual Hamline classes, I started to learn what I would need to be successful in the field of Social Justice. I learned about the history of the Feminist Movement, the various techniques used by the Civil Rights Movement, and just how ignored ableism is. I’ve gone to Hamline for five years, and even when I was a chemistry major, I looked for classes about disabilities and ableism. Yet, I’ve only found three. In my Intro to Social Justice class, when I tried to use the group project we had to talk about ableism, no one else was interested.

In the end, while my time at Hamline hasn’t been a long one, and my decision to become a Social Justice major started long before it, I can’t say I haven’t learned a lot. From the skills I learned from classes, to learning how to be a more accepting person from my friends, to discovering things about myself I didn’t know before, I have learned more about the world than I previously had even known there was to know, and I look forward to using it to help people as I go out into the world.