THE HAMSTRA FORUM

James Azim

“I’ve changed a lot. I’ve become a lot more mature and I definitely have a different worldview. I felt radical when I was younger, now I tend to have a more moderate view on a lot of things, and I think about things a lot more rather than just feeling things. I think [COVID] also made me realize how hard a lot of the teachers are working. I think the biggest thing is having very good teachers who care about the students, and I think that makes the biggest difference and COVID definitely helped me realize that more. Now I actually care about learning things. I used to think of school as just a grade and there’s a lot of teachers who I care more about giving them a good assignment than just getting a good grade on it. I took Sean Eldon’s philosophical literature class and I think he helped me become a much better writer and that was a class that I probably put more effort into than any other English class because I don’t like English that much, but he made me feel like it was worth it to actually read the material, process it, care about it, and have a genuine unique thought about it and not just the same thing that everyone says. The name really says it all, about having a community of people that support and uplift each other and there’s not such a separation between the administrators and the students. There’s a much more close relationship there. There’s a mutual respect and appreciation here.”