Meet Cat Birkenfeld, USC Dornsife Ambassador!
The following is an computer-generated summary of the video transcript.
Hi everyone, my name is Cat Birkenfeld and I am a sophomore at USC Dornsife and I double major in non government organizations and social change and Psychology and I also have a minor in social work in juvenile justice and I'm on the pre occupational therapy track and I am just so excited to start talking to you guys about just how incredible USC dornsife is. I am actually from Peoria Arizona, but I am lucky enough to be back in Los Angeles right now. I live about five minutes from campus on 29th Street and today I am in front of joe Heaney library right here on campus and it's right in the center and it's so beautiful out today and I'm just really excited to start creating videos and show you all around campus. I know it must be really difficult right now if you're unable to visit campus. So I hope that these videos can make us feel a little bit more tangible and a little bit more like home here is my beautiful view of Tahiti Library and all of the buildings kind of near the center of campus. It is so beautiful here and I love coming here to do work and just appreciating how amazing our campuses. So I'll give a little background into why I chose USC Dornsife and it's because just of how incredibly encouraging the school is about pursuing interdisciplinary studies and because it has allowed me to pursue my love and my passion for social justice while establishing really important psychological foundations that ground all of my future endeavors. I definitely want to mention that I understand how difficult it can be to discover what you are passionate about and to explore um the studies that can propel you through that and there was for sure, times when I was completely uncertain of what I was passionate about, but with the beauty of USC and of dornsife is that there is so much room for you to explore and to grow over time. So I actually came into U. S. C. As an aspiring pediatric occupational therapist and I was going to add on a major in journalism and then my second semester of freshman year, I enrolled in a class called Peter for 88 Theater in the community where we partnered with a public policy class and to community partners who were formerly incarcerated and we wrote and produced and performed an original show um regarding the plights of mass incarceration and the importance of resorted justice. This class was ultimately what led me to pursue the NgoS and social change major. It also accounted for credit for that and it's what has led me to now be pursuing occupational therapy within the incarceration system as a facet of restorative justice. I still keep in touch and work with our community partners today. Um they are some of my most important people in my life and it truly is just amazing how one class can completely alter the course of your life and so definitely sees any opportunities to take classes that excite you and bring you joy whenever you can. So it was so nice getting to talk to you all today in front of our beautiful campus in my first video and I'm so, so excited to continue showing you just how beautiful USC dornsife is and I just have so much love for our school and our students and our campus and I'm so excited to share all of that love with you and until next time fight on.