Building Bridges on Maryland Day

“How can we bridge divides in our community?”

It’s a question both straightforward and complicated. Written at the top of a board we displayed, it was the query we asked passersby to answer on Maryland Day–a day when thousands of people come to campus to explore the university’s programs and activities. Participants wrote their responses on a notecard, and over the course of the day, we built a two-dimensional bridge out of their answers.

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Book Review: A Nation of Immigrants

This is a book review of “A Nation of Immigrants” by John F. Kennedy. The review was written by Sharath Patil. 

These States are the amplest poem,

Here is not merely a nation but

A teeming Nation of nations.”

                             -Walt Whitman[1]

In 2018, Congressman Joe Kennedy III (D-MA), re-published a classic by his great-uncle, former U.S. President John F. Kennedy: A Nation of Immigrants. Although the book has been widely celebrated for decades, Joe Kennedy intended to demonstrate the relevance of JFK’s principles and values to debates around immigration policy today. As the first Roman Catholic U.S. president, Kennedy’s election was a critical milestone in this nation’s path to becoming a more inclusive country. Throughout his presidency, Kennedy did not forget his own immigrant roots nor that of most Americans. Irish by heritage, Kennedy wrote with great respect for the suffering that so many Irish immigrants to the United States endured – particularly during the Irish potato famine and under British rule.

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