Juliana Rodriguez '14

Current Roles: Project manager, communications coordinator, trainer, facilitator

Concentration: Environmental studies

Juliana considered the CRC to be “a home away from home for me basically sophomore year and on.” She worked at the CRC as a MAPS co-coordinator and peer advisor, speaking on her responsibilities “I coordinated the advising program for sophomores, the key components of which were interviewing and selecting peer mentors for the program, pairing those mentors with mentees based on common interests, and organizing events for MAPS participations throughout the year.” Juliana mentions that working as a MAPS coordinator and it was “really awesome, because it was for sophomores and during my sophomore year I was like ‘Wait, what? What am I doing?’ so I felt really good about trying to provide some sort of peer advising to people in their second year, where it’s getting a little more real.”

While Juliana admits she didn’t participate in the leaving taking program, do any GISPs or ICs, she says that “being aware of these options and being surrounded by people thinking through those options definitely made me more thoughtful about my own choices. Reading the IC application was one of the most important things I did while at Brown--the questions in the application weren’t any that I had been asked of me before or after I chose my concentration and I think they should’ve been.”

Though she didn’t indulge in these more specific Open Curriculum programs, Juliana believes she “really took the Open Curriculum to heart and took classes in all types of concentrations. Even once I had decided I wanted to concentrate in Environmental Studies, I was still taking classes in comparative literature and whatever else. I had a list of classes that I had to take and, as much as I loved my concentration, I also felt like it could benefit from classes in sociology or whatever else. I had a list of classes that I had to take and, as much as i loved my concentration, I also felt like it could benefit from classes in sociology or whatever else, and it just didn’t feel like I had the flexibility to make the case sometimes. Juliana says she is “Really grateful to the CRC because I ended up having those conversations, and I don’t think everyone does or finds their way to the second floor of Faunce and finds that room and those people.”