Blog

Trinity’s Center for Urban and Global Studies (CUGS) recently celebrated a decade of summer study in China by hosting a gathering of more than 20 past participants of the college’s China summer study away program. Alumni traveled back to campus from around the United States and overseas to join members of the faculty who have led the program and current students who have participated in China summer study, reconnecting with one another and making new connections as they reflected on their experiences and how they have influenced their educational and professional careers.

Trinity College’s Center for Urban and Global Studies (CUGS) recently hosted a panel discussion on Turkey’s shift from a democratic to an autocratic regime. The March 28 event, titled “At the Crossroads: Identity and Conflict in Turkey,” served as both an academic exploration of the topic and a celebration of Trinity’s commitment to hosting academics in exile. Since 2008, CUGS has hosted seven visiting rescue scholars facing severe and targeted threats to their lives and/or careers because of their academic work in their home countries.

Trinity College alumna Mariam Avagyan ’18 was welcomed back to campus recently to give a presentation about a robotics and coding camp for children that she hosted last summer in her home country of Armenia using a Davis Projects for Peace grant. The April 9 presentation was part of the Global Vantage Point Lecture Series at Trinity’s Center for Urban and Global Studies. Avagyan, who double-majored in mathematics and electrical engineering at Trinity and is now an engineering Ph.D. student at Columbia University, was awarded a Davis Projects for Peace grant in 2018, as one of two Trinity students to receive the grant that year.

Students visited NYC on Friday April 26 as part of the Urban Studies course The Politics of Real Estate with a community learning component. Taught by Kelter Post-Doctoral Fellow Emily Yen, the course examines the political, social, and economic dimensions of real estate in Hartford and New York. It delves into the tension between use and exchange values and how political context shapes the balance of power between stakeholders in these cities. On the trip, students had the opportunity to learn from non-profit, business, and academic leaders about the various stakeholders affecting real estate in New York.

The Center for Urban and Global Studies (CUGS) at Trinity College took 14 students on a field study course to the Pearl River Delta in June. This was the 11th year the Center has taken students to China and surrounding countries to study cities. The course themes were urbanization, innovation, and migration in the cities of Shenzhen, Dongguan, Huizhou, and Hong Kong.

October 2017 marks the 10th anniversary of the Center for Urban and Global Studies (CUGS) at Trinity College. Since its official launch in October 2007, CUGS has played a major role in developing and connecting urban and global initiatives and activities on campus, in Hartford, and around the world.

Since its founding, CUGS has been highly successful in developing an intellectual identity that encompasses academic study both on campus and abroad. Links to Hartford’s local communities were built into the package to create a smooth interface between global study efforts and our home base of Hartford.

The first Fall 2017 Global Vantage Point Lecture Series event featured three Trinity students who presented their summer 2017 field research.