Global Development's New Year Resolution 2024

For a month, we have sent an open survey to students, alumni and faculty around Global Development to learn more about what's giving our community hope or what they expect to change in 2024. This year hasn't been easy, so we made a collective effort to shine some light in these dark times.

Most second-year students included in their wish list something in regards the master thesis they’re working on now. “Have a great experience abroad collecting data for the master’s thesis”, “Find a good supervisor that will answer my questions” or “I hope that my group will work together, and our idea turns out to be doable and successful”. There were also some dreams about the future after graduation: “I want to achieve my dream of graduating from a master's program and begin working full time at a workplace and with topics that I am passionate about” or “I'm looking forward to a nice summer after graduation where I can relax and look back to a nice experience of a master”. These dreams were also accompanied by worries about the future uncertainties: “I'm worried about the job opportunities after graduation. I hope I can find a nice job for the fall that fulfills my expectations”, “I hope to survive economically while doing an unpaid internship”, “I hope I can stay in Denmark” or simply “I hope to survive my second winter in Denmark!”. Global Development students also reflected on changes they would like to see at the University and Master level: “student-professor should have more engagement outside of class, office hour should be longer”, “accept more students from Global South backgrounds”, “I hope that all students can feel safe learning in the GD program” or “introducing professors sensitive training” as well.

However, the dreams and hopes reach further than the University´s walls, and students and faculty members also expressed the changes they expect to see in the world. Some hopeful people dreamt of “A more stable world” with “Less war” and “More peace” considering the times that we are living, as well as “Hope that people do not lose energy or aspirations to continue fighting against the challenges that our world faces”. More specifically, some appealed to “A less racist and anti-immigration Denmark”, “Proper climate action”, “Higher voter turnout amongst younger populations”, “Fair wages and affordable living”, “Continued trend to restrict corporations so capitalism benefits the people not just shareholders” and “Hope that 2024 will bring more international political and development cooperation”.

Through this survey, we could also sense the changes that the Global Development community expect for the upcoming year: “I want to explore more of Denmark outside of Copenhagen, and to travel in Europe slowly by train” and “Draw more”. Or in a more personal level: “To spend more quality time with friends, and to be the one to initiate ideas and show that I've been thinking of them”, “keep my amazing GD friends” or “to overthink things less, to feel more in tune with my feelings and to make sure that I do things for good reasons”. There are also alumni that are looking forward to seeing former global development students after so many years: “In 2024, I aim to do an extended train trip visiting former global development classmates around Europe”

Finally, someone expressed a feeling that may resonate with all of us: “One of my goals and hopes for the coming year is to be better at focusing on the positives. Across the board, both in my personal life, in the small things, work and study wise, but also in the world, I guess? There’s such a constant bombardment of terrible news and things we should know and be outraged about, and it becomes really hard to see the light and shed some of that heaviness. So that’s something that I want to get better at. Enjoying the small things and seeing the good in the world around me. And not constantly refreshing news feeds and feeling pressure to be totally up to date on world events all the time.”