In this season finale, Cadie and Emma are joined by Dr. Niklas Hultin to discuss the ins and outs of the GLOA program!
EMMA: Hello, welcome to CHSS Connection, a podcast where we interview different students or faculty about all things CHSS, from academics to careers to everything in between. This is a student success podcast for CHSS students by CHSS students. However, if you're not a CHSS student, welcome, we're so glad you're here. I'm Emma Howard! CADIE: I'm Cadie Junker! BOTH: And we're your hosts. CADIE: We are once again at our spotlight episode, and in this episode is special for several reasons. This is indeed the last episode of the season. By the time you're listening to this, we'll be done with finals and the 2025-2026 school year. Thank you all so much for making our premiere season so special. And we're so excited to see how this podcast continues to grow. The second reason this episode is special is that we have an incredibly talented guest on today. He graduated with his PhD in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania, is the former director of the Undergraduate Global Affairs Program, and has become the director of our Graduate Global Affairs Program here in CHSS. Please welcome to the podcast, Dr. Niklas Hultin. Dr. Hultin, thank you so much for joining us. DR. HULTIN: It's my pleasure to be here. CADIE: How are you doing today? DR. HULTIN: I'm doing very well, thank you. Enjoying the last week of the semester. EMMA: Yes. How is that treating you? DR. HULTIN: It's busy. But it's nice. And at least we have nice weather. So there's that. CADIE: Yeah, absolutely. EMMA: So, to get us started, Dr. Hultin, for anyone who doesn't know you, what do you do in the Global Affairs Program? DR. HULTIN: So, I wear two hats, right? I mean, I have a faculty hat. So I teach and do research and do all this stuff that all our faculty members do. And I also, as was said in the introduction, I'm also the director of the Graduate Program in Global Affairs. And also the MA in Middle East and Islamic Studies is housed in Global Affairs. So I'm also directing that on a sort of more distant level, if you will. CADIE: Yeah, I mean, that all sounds very impressive. I'm really curious to hear about, as you said, you have those multiple hats. What was your path to becoming the director of the Graduate Studies at GLOA here at GMU? I know we were talking beforehand. You also mentioned that you used to be the director of the Undergraduate Studies as well. DR. HULTIN: So, when I started at Mason, which is back in 2014, so I've been at Mason for 12 years, I was hired to be the undergrad director. And then over time, you know, I stopped doing that. I was a kind of, if you want to call it a regular faculty member for a bit. And let's see, about two years ago, without going into the kind of boring bureaucratic weeds of it, Global Affairs, the program actually was administratively rearranged a little bit. And as part of that, we had to appoint a director of Graduate Studies. So before that, we didn't have it. We didn't have a director of Graduate Studies. And I said, I'm interested in doing that. And that was it. It was as simple as that. CADIE: And you got the job. EMMA: Yes. What has that shift been like for you to move from working with an undergraduate population to a graduate population? DR. HULTIN: I mean, not as pronounced as you would think. I think for a couple of different reasons. One is that throughout my Mason career, I've taught both undergrads and grad students. Even when I was the undergrad director, I would teach our introduction class in the MA, as well as I wanted to BA at the same time, right? So, I always worked with undergrads and grad students. And then we also have a lot of students who kind of bridge that. We have a lot of accelerated MA students. So sometimes we have students that, you know, we might have seen in undergrad classes, and then we see them in our MA classes. So the difference is not quite that big as you might think. And of course, a lot of policies and things like that are actually broadly similar, even though there are grad and undergrad specific things as well. I think the difference is more in the sense of some of the external stakeholders we have. So for example, in the Global Affairs MA, we have a significant number of students from the military. So Mason is one of the programs that, you know, sort of officers can go to for their civilian training. And that's an issue or not an issue. That is like a facet of the job that doesn't really exist onthe undergrad level, because we don't really have the same kind of program, but obviously have veterans and ROTC and all that kind of stuff at undergrad level as well. But having this kind of specific program, we don't really have that. So that's a new thing. I spend more time talking to the U.S. Army than I thought I would when I started this role. But it's been really interesting. EMMA: Why do you think that that's a trend or that connection is there, that interaction between like military or veterans and global affairs? DR. HULTIN: Well, I mean, partly the topic, right? I mean, people with military experience and not just people in military experience. I mean, a lot of people, especially in this kind of greater Washington, D.C. area are really interested in the rest of the world. And we are Global Affairs and we cover the world. The other, in terms of the specific program that I was referencing earlier, the, that's a, and there's an acronym for it that I can never remember, because it's the, you know, the Pentagon. But so our MA is kind of the civilian component of a multi-year kind of training program for some officers. So they do advanced language training, you know, at the Defense Language Institute in California. They come here, do their MA, then get postings overseas. And they basically get sent to work to different parts of the world. So they're kind of like, like military attaches or something like that. So like they get stationed in, you know, Colombia or, you know, Jordan or, you know, insert country X. And they work with sort of their counterparts in those kinds of militaries to, you know, promote everything from sort of training and whatnot. But in order to be able to do that, and this is true for any kind of job, not just the military. If you want to work in a different part of the world, you need to understand that part of the world. That sounds like a really kind of banal thing to say, but it's true. A lot of times people don't seem to realize that. I mean, you need to know the history, the politics, the religion, you know, the dynamics between countries in that part of the world and so forth. So they come here for that. And I think what's really kind of cool and rewarding for us is that these students are in the same classroom as our kind of, I'm doing air quotes now, like regular MA students, right? So, it's not like the separate program. So, if when I, so I teach my Global Affairs or one of my Global Affairs seminars this afternoon in that class, I have two foreign area officers, as they're called. I have students who have, you know, maybe worked for five to 10 years, usually at a think tank or something in DC. They came back for the MA, and I have Mason undergrads all in the same classroom. And they're all contributing equally and, you know, get graded equally and do equally good job. And that's actually a lot of fun. EMMA: That sounds like a lot of fun. I didn't realize that was an element of Mason's global presence. And that's really neat. So, you've already told us a lot about your time here at Mason and how deeply embedded you are in the program, and how you really got to see it grow, and especially getting to see the retention of undergraduate students to graduate students. What would you say is your favorite aspect or characteristic of the global affairs program? DR. HULTIN: That's a hard question. Not hard because it's hard to answer, but it's hard to choose which answer. And I think, you know, especially when I talk, if I'm talking to students or other faculty, there are different parts of the university that you kind of interface with, right? I do have a great degree of fondness for my colleagues, right? And that's really important. I mean, you hate to work at a place where you can't stand people that you work with. And I don't have that experience. So I think all of us as faculty, we get along really well. And I think that benefits everybody because, you know, if I have a class that, oh, that didn't quite work, you know, that assignment didn't land quite right. I mean, I can go to a colleague and say like, okay, so what were you in this situation? How do you think I should change? And all that kind of stuff. And we spend a lot of time talking to each other about our teaching and about our students. I don't think a lot of times students understand how much faculty members actually talk about the classes that they teach because they care about it. And even if they don't always do a very good job, most of the time I think we do, but sometimes we goof up. I mean, it happens, right? I mean, it's not, and we really don't want that to happen. We want to kind of, we want to get better and want to, you know, transform our teaching. So that's one part of it. The other part that's also, well, more important is the students, right? So we see students from, I mean, we used to say that, I mean, George Mason is, I think, Virginia's most diverse public university by any metric, you know, ethnic, religious, political leanings, sexual orientation, you know, what have you, right? By any metric, we'll be the most diverse. And we sometimes joke that Global Affairs is the most diverse program at George Mason. I don't know if that's true. That might not be accurate, but we do have a student body that is, you know, just brings a very kind of broad range of life experiences to the table. And, you know, there's, I mean, part of it is we have a lot of international students, but that's not it, you know? It's not just simply the fact of international students, but we have students who come from, you know, everyone from Fairfax to, you know, that is either world or Southwest Virginia or somewhere, and they bring their experiences. And having that interaction in the classroom, I think is really quite special. EMMA: It is. CADIE: Absolutely. You've been here for 14 years, as you mentioned. What's one memory that stands out during that time that you've been here, from teaching to being the director of the undergrad program to now being the director of the graduate program? Is there one specific memory or anecdote that you have that really stands out to you? DR. HULTIN: I would say it's a specific event, like a singular event, but a specific repeated event, if I may kind of dodge the question a little bit. CADIE: Absolutely. DR. HULTIN: And it's the season for it, and that actually is graduation, because we're very close to it. And, you know, both the CHSS graduation ceremony, when the students get to, you know, wear the regalia and walk across the stage and all that kind of stuff, as well as the graduation celebration we do in the program. I think as a faculty member, I don't know how many graduations I've been to in my life. You know, I've been to my own multiple ones and, you know, all that kind of stuff. And I've been teaching for some 20 years. So it's easy sometimes to be a little bit jaded about it in a way, but I'm not. I think it's really important. It's really, you know, it's really quite something to see people celebrating. They've been working for, you know, four or more years in some cases, and they've been working very, very hard. Not all students, but most of them are working very hard. And, you know, sometimes they have worked really hard under circumstances that we don't really know about that made it seem like they didn't care or something, but they really did, right? And they're there with their family and friends and it's celebration. And I think that's probably my favorite event. It's kind of weird because then you don't see the students again. So that's the sad part about that event. But all, you know, positive memories have a little tinge of wistfulness to them, I think. EMMA: Yeah. I imagine it is very bittersweet, like you were alluding to. And also, I'm sure it's also very affirming, considering everything that's going on in the world of higher education right now, just getting to see students who have made it through their college careers and are now entering the world. And to know that you and your colleagues played a part in that, I'm sure that's very rewarding. DR. HULTIN: Yeah. And sometimes we do get emails, you know, down, you know, five, six years down the road from a student saying, oh, you know, since I graduated and I took that one class with you, I'm now doing X, Y, and Z, or I'm going, a lot of times it's like, I'm applying to grad school. Can you write me a letter of rec? Which, of course, I'm happy to do. But sometimes it's just like a life update. And, you know, you never really know where the students will move. I mean, I have one former student, for example, who, I can't remember her exact title, but she works in like the president's office of Orange, which is a French telephone company. Like, it's like Verizon, but French. CADIE: Yes! I do remember these people. DR. HULTIN: Yeah. CADIE: Because it was a very popular eSIM to get when I studied abroad. I studied abroad in Spain, not France, but they have a very big presence in Spain too. DR. HULTIN: Yeah, they're massive. They're big all over Europe, all over Africa. And so she works in the president's office of Orange Cote d'Ivoire, which is a huge African market. And it's just really neat to think that this incredibly talented, smart woman came from Mason to there. I mean, she had family ties there, so it's not like she had no connection to Cote d'Ivoire. But those kind of connections that we make are really rewarding, I think, too. EMMA: Absolutely. You said something in that response that I'd love to follow up on. You mentioned how you get emails and not check-ins, but follow-ups from students even years after they've graduated. I think sometimes there's a hesitancy from not only just current students, but students who have graduated, alumni, who don't realize that they can utilize the connections and the professors and the relationships that they built in college. And so what would you say to students or alumni who maybe are thinking about reaching out to a professor who maybe they need to get a letter of rec from, or just want advice from, or to get a coffee with? Like, how do you encourage them to approach that? DR. HULTIN: I mean, I think... So one thing I always tell students and also prospective Mason students is that, sure, I mean, we're all individuals, we're all people that may have bad days, and sometimes you don't get along with people, and life happens, right? But there's not a single faculty member at Mason who does not want you to do well, right? I mean, we can accept there's a baseline. We all want you to succeed, because we actually care, right? You're here studying with us for four years or something, and we don't want that to be for nothing, right? That would be really sad. And so it's important, I think, for us that our students are successful. So we'd love to hear that. And obviously, we all get a gazillion emails a day. And so I would say, if you're a student or a former student, even a professor, and you don't get a response in a week or something, I certainly would not take that personally. I would maybe send a very polite reminder, oh, I'm sorry, professor such and such, if you saw this. And I'm not gonna say that all professors would, there's always gonna be some personal idiosyncrasies, right? But I think most people would be really glad to see that. So I would really encourage them to do so. And I think for letters of rec, because I mean, that is the most common kind of interaction we have with alumni. The main issue there is a lot of times just to give us enough time, right? Don't email us two days before it's due. Email us like a month before it's due. And I'm also gonna remind you that, depending on what you're teaching, we might be teaching hundreds of students a semester. And if you took my class in 2017, even if you did really, really well, and we had really good interactions around assignments and all that kind of stuff, I may not fully remember you. I mean, and that's terrible. But you may need to jog my memory, right? You may have to remind me, not just what class you took, but maybe if you still have the paper, send it to me, because we don't keep papers for 10 years, right? Send me your CV, or just help me sort of contextualize you. CADIE: Yeah. I always wonder how much professors remember, especially about their students, because I had this history teacher in sixth and seventh grade, shout out to Mr. Kline. Still one of the best professors that I've ever had. And I saw him again at high school graduation. Now, I did not go to that same school for high school. It was like a middle and high school thing. I went to a public school for high school. But he saw me, and it sounded like he remembered me. And in my mind, I'm gonna say that he remembered me. But I am always curious about, you teach, even in high school, middle school, you teach 100 students for years and years and years. You remember all of our names for the school year, sure. But how often does that actually get retained in your memory? DR. HULTIN: And yeah, no, I mean, and it's... I wish I could say we remember all our students, and that's, of course, not true, right? I mean, we tend to remember the students who do really well, and we tend to remember the students who do really badly. And we tend to remember the students who we had some kind of interaction with, if they, if we helped them find an internship, or if they sought us out during office hours because they're really interested in an aspect of our work, then we remember them. I mean, that's just kind of human nature. It's not necessarily intentional, right? Because more interaction with them. So if I were to give advice to students who really wanna cultivate this kind of relationship with a faculty member, that they do feel comfortable down the road, say, hey, I'm applying for grad school now, or I need you to be a reference for my job or whatever. You know, use our office hours, talk to us after class. I mean, that sounds very kind of cynical, say, if you want us to remember you, you need to talk to us. But also that's kind of true, right? If you're kind of in a 45-student class, sitting in the back of the classroom, never speak up, we don't talk to you, other than that, it's... I'm not saying we won't remember you, but it's gonna be harder. CADIE: Right, right. EMMA: No, no, but you're right. I think there is a level of proactivity that comes with, especially if you want to maintain connections going into your professional career, you need to cultivate that during your college career. DR. HULTIN: Yeah, and I know it can be awkward. I mean, all of us have been students too. And, you know, I remember being incredibly shy, is not the right word, but I thought it was really awkward talking to professors. But I went to a very small liberal arts college where that was kind of the norm, right? You know, I had classes with two students, right? So you couldn't avoid them, right? So, but yeah, I mean, I have to remember that, you know, no professor, and sure, students might dislike a professor or whatever. It might be all kinds of like, oh, I don't like him because he's boring or what have you, right? But we actually, we're here because we like working with students. We like to talk to students. You know, it's not like we, you know, kind of, how should I put this? It's not like we have a lot of times, like we chose to become academics, despite students, right? I mean, it's like teaching is something we enjoy and working with students. So I think it's, you know, even if as a student, you feel a little bit awkward come out to professor class saying, hey, I'm really interesting. I've read online that you work in Peru and I'm really interested in Peru. And no one tells them question about Peru, but I just want you to know I'm really interested in Peru. No professor can be like, oh, well, that's dumb, go away. You know, like something, right? The opposite is going to happen. So I think that that's really important. EMMA: Continuing the giving of advice and disclaimers to students, what do you think is a misconception about Global Affairs you wish students knew about? DR. HULTIN: Well, I think that there is a risk for confusion between Global Affairs and other programs, right? I mean, Mason has a number of programs with some kind of global outlook. You know, we have all the programs in the Schar School, which, you know, they have an international law security program, the Carter School as well. So, I think sometimes it's just a little bit unclear to students what the differences are, right? So, I'm not sure that's a confusion about Global Affairs per se. It's just kind of like, you know, the world is a big place and there's a lot of scholars who work outside the world, like outside the United States. So I think what I would tell students there is that it's important to recognize that Global Affairs is interdisciplinary. And I realize that term may not mean a lot if you come straight from high school, what does it mean to be interdisciplinary? But if you're a global affairs major or you're a global affairs MA, you're not just going to read and learn about politics. You will get a lot of that too, don't get me wrong, but you will also get a lot of stuff like global culture and global media and climate change or global geography and all that kind of stuff, right? So, you know, I think we kind of start from the premise that whatever issue you're interested in, right, because all students are interested in something, whether it's, you know, addressing the global refugee crisis or whether it's thinking more about, I don't know, the rise of K-pop, two very different examples, right? Or whether you're really concerned about, you know, transnational crime or pollution or what have you, right? Any of those issues, you need to bring a lot of different perspectives to bear to understand them. You cannot just say, oh, just about politics or it's just about religion or whatever, right? You need to have this kind of nimble mind and say, okay, there's a lot of different ways on twisting and turning that. And I think that's what we're trying to instill in our students. And it seems to be working since we're a very popular major. EMMA: Yeah, 100%. Given how interdisciplinary global affairs is, how do you recommend students go about clarifying their interests or finding out more about the distinctions between subfields and topics within that industry? DR. HULTIN: I think there's a couple of different approaches and they're all equally good, like, and you should ideally do all of the above, right? Well, all of the above, I haven't said them yet. I mean, one, of course, is to talk to peers and professors and your undergrad advisor. You know, what we teach in the classroom is really just like a thin slice of what we know, right? Especially in intro classes, right? I mean, I know I've done a lot of work in human rights. And when I teach Global 101, we maybe spend, what, one week on human rights. And that's just very, very small fraction of what there is to say. So I would say, if you're in a 101 level class or kind of figure out, OK, which week will it work for me? What was kind of interesting? What do I want to know more about? And talk to professors. I would also say, and my son will tell me I sound like a boomer now, but I think reading international news, right? And I always tell my students that, look, as part of being at Mason, you get a free subscription to Financial Times, which is a very expensive subscription. And God knows you guys are paying a lot of money to be here. So take that, right? You also get New York Times. And don't let “Financial” scare you away. I mean, sure, there's a lot of business, but business is important. But, you know, just read broadly and, you know, read in depth, but also read broadly and figure out what is it that excites you? Because you never know what's going to excite you. I mean, I can use myself as an example. I spent pretty much my entire adult life doing research on The Gambia in West Africa. When I was a high school student, I'd never heard of The Gambia, pretty much. I mean, it was a long time ago. But like if somebody told me when I was like 16 year old, like, oh, you're going to spend the next several decades reading about The Gambia, writing about The Gambia, being in The Gambia. I'd be like, what? You're high or something. So you never know what kind of is going to pique your interest that way. So yeah, you can't be interested in something if you don't kind of give yourself the opportunity to be open to that topic in the first place. EMMA: Very true. CADIE: Yeah. On the similar path of advice, setting up students for success, if students wanted to pursue a higher education in global affairs, particularly here at Mason, what's your advice for getting into the graduate program? DR> HULTIN: At the risk of sounding like a broken record, say I will always say talking to your professors that, well, talk to your professors who are going to write you letters of rec. That's important. But also, you know, see if you can talk to professors who will teach in the program, which might be the same people, right? Especially if you're a Global Affairs undergrad. But I would say, again, depends a little bit on how you end. If you're a current student and you're like, say, a sophomore or junior, I would encourage students to look at the accelerated MA option. And that's not just for Global Affairs. I have a number of them in CHSS and across university. I don't know how many there are, I think like 30 or something. CADIE: I'm officially a BAM student. EMMA: Yes, you are. DR. HULTIN: Yeah, because I think that's a really good... I know it's a lot of work and it's daunting to think that you're going to start thinking about graduate school when you're a sophomore in some cases, but it does save you a lot of time and money. And that's kind of a crass way of thinking about it, but that's not unimportant. So I would say, if that's in the cards for you and you can't be too far along in your Mason career, you can't do it like your last semester, your senior year, you have to have a minimum GPA of 3.25, a couple of restrictions like that. If you are kind of within the ballpark there, I would say definitely look into that as a way to give yourself a kind of pathway into the MA that's kind of much quicker and cheaper. But if that doesn't work for you, you don't have to have a... We don't actually have like a... In the Global Affairs program, we don't have a minimum GPA. We don't require a specific major. Obviously, if your undergrad degree isn't something that's completely outside of social sciences, humanities, it might be hard of you to adjust to a MA in an interdisciplinary event in social science program. But we don't kind of prejudge you. So, we accept applications from anyone at Mason. We review everyone. And what we kind of pay a lot of attention to is the personal statement. Because we want... You know, getting a grad degree, whether you do it as an accelerated or not, it's a big investment. It's a big decision. And we don't want you to pick what's actually wrong for you. So, we look at a lot of the statement, but we also look at letters of recommendation, of course, undergrad transcript, and so forth. But I would say if you're interested in doing a graduate degree at Mason and you're a current Mason student, find out who runs the grad program that you intend to apply to. And go and talk to them. It might be a professor. It might be... They might have like a graduate advisor or somebody just to sort of like get a better sense of what expectations are. Because grad school is a different beast. It's not just undergrad with like one more article to read. It's a different kind of workload, smaller classes, all that kind of stuff. So it's a different kind of environment to be in. EMMA: I'm curious. You mentioned how the Global Affairs grad programs were accepting of majors. Everyone gets fair consideration. And there's the Global Affairs undergrad program. And I imagine there's a good amount that pursue the accelerated masters. How many non-Global Affairs undergrads do you see enter the accelerated masters for GLOA? I just said a lot of words. Don't worry. DR. HULTIN: I'm like thinking about the demographics of our student body and trying to segment the different populations. You're asking me about students who are entering the accelerated MA who are not undergrad majors in GLOA. That's not a lot of them. I think in part because people don't even know that's an option. CADIE: I didn't know that was an option. DR. HULTIN: And I mean, we've been working on trying to kind of clarify some of the kind of messaging around that just so students know that is an option. But of course, if you're an undergrad, I don't know. If you're a psychology major and you really like psychology, maybe you wanted to pursue the accelerated MA in psychology. I don't know if I have one in psychology, I can assume we do, and not Global Affairs. And yeah, I mean, that makes sense, right? So, I think I can't remember the top of the head if these students are accelerated or not. Because the other thing to know- EMMA: No worries, yeah. DR. HULTIN: In the classroom, we don't know that, right? It's the same classes, same assignments. You're not treated differently for accelerated MA, which can be intimidating maybe. But you're in grad class. You're a grad student when you're in grad class. I mean, I'm thinking about my class that I'm teaching this afternoon. I know there's three students in there that came through the accelerated MA program. But I don't know that because of the class listing. Then there's no star next to the class, their name, something. That's because I know who they are, right? But we do have a number of students who come from other departments who do their MA in Global Affairs, a lot of times because they want to, they realize that whatever kind of subject they're interested in, they want to kind of gain a more global perspective on it. That's a pretty common kind of argument. Or they just kind of change their mind. I had one student who did her undergrad degree in a different CHSS department. I'm not going to say which one, and decided it just wasn't for them. And so this student decided to do Global Affairs instead. EMMA: Very nice to hear. Yeah. I think on the podcast, we like to promote or hear about other, maybe like nonlinear paths of pursuing like your education or your career. So, but that's really, that's nice to hear. Speaking of career paths and professional paths, could you tell us a bit about the career paths that someone studying GLOA could pursue? DR. HULTIN: Yeah, so I like to kind of mentally divide into a couple of different sort of buckets. We do have a lot of, and I'm speaking both of BA graduates and MA graduates here. We do have traditionally a very big bucket that will go into some kind of federal employment. We have graduates work for State Department, different parts of the military, the Forest Service, USAID, Voice of America. If you've been reading the news in the last year, you'll notice a lot of those entities have seen significant staffing cuts. That is, of course, a reality that we all have to deal with in various ways. So I think that bucket is, relatively speaking, smaller today than it would be like four years ago. But it will probably grow again, right? I mean, none of these changes are permanent. But that's like one bucket. We also have a very big bucket of students who go off and work in the private sector. So that would be like the big Beltway consultancies, Accenture, those kind of places. But also smaller, can be a smaller bank in your hometown also. I mean, that's the private sector, right? But we certainly have a number of graduates who work for different basically contractors in defense and development and global issues. We also have a number of students who are with non-profits, think tanks, civil society organizations. A lot of them having to do with specific issues that have a global element to them, like migration, for example. That's a big one. And then we also have students who, some students who get jobs in international organizations, like the World Bank. A number of graduates work with the World Bank, International Monetary Fund. I mean, they're both in DC. We have a couple of people who work in various parts of the UN system. And then, of course, we have students who work, who are not American, who end up working for the foreign service of their home countries. And I think we have a couple of graduates who are stationed at their home countries' embassies in DC and things like that. So those are kind of like the big buckets, and they're different in size a little bit. But then we also have a number of students who are going to grad school. And that's true both for the BA and MA. So some people get an MA here, especially accelerated ones. They do an MA here, and then they want to go do something, get a second master's or maybe get a law degree or something. And we have a few PhD students coming out of that as well. So law school is very popular. I think there's kind of a misconception sometimes that if you want to go to law school, you have to be pre-law. That's actually not true. Even the American Bar Association says that. That's not true. So unfortunately, that message seems to kind of have landed with students that they realize they can pursue whatever major they want and still be competitive for law school. So we have students who proceeded to Columbia Law School, Indiana University Law School, and George Mason Law School as well. A lot of them work in international issues of some sort. CADIE: Very neat. Yeah. It's nice to know that Global Affairs, the career possibilities are just as broad as the coursework is. I know this isn't integrative or individualized studies, but in a way, it sort of is a choose-your-own-major path as long as it's about some sort of global issue and global topic. EMMA: It's also relieving, I imagine, for GLOA students to know and hear that the content that's being covered in their courses is actually going to be relevant and important to the work that they're going to do in their careers. DR. HULTIN: Yeah. And we don't want to lock students into a specific path. We want to sort of enable them to pursue the path they want to pursue. And enabling sometimes means maybe like steering them a little bit. And they're obviously... If you want to go to medical school, you can be a Global Affairs major, but you probably have to do some advanced coursework in chemistry and biology along with that. That's just the way it is. But yeah, so I always kind of tell students, whether they're Global Affairs majors or prospective students or whatever, that your major's important, not because it will lock you into a career. Again, there are some majors that have licensing requirements and things like that, but we've talked about the kind of CHSS majors. But their majors are kind of vehicles for you to explore and do well in issues you really care about. So, if hypothetically, if I'm meeting with a student who is completely uninterested in Global Affairs, I don't know why that would be the case, but I would not encourage them to be Global Affairs major because they probably wouldn't do well. Then they're better off doing whatever it is they're interested in instead. So yeah, I think it's really important when you're a student to think not just about what it says in your diploma, but the kind of skills and knowledge base you acquire as part of that degree program. And then if you will do well doing that, because at the end of the day, your GPA is going to matter. And it's probably better to have a 4.0 in a major, I'm not going to mention specific majors, but in a major that maybe does not have the same kind of luster as other majors than having a 2.5 in a major that has such luster. CADIE: Yeah, it's better to be well, I'll say the major because I'm a part of it. Communications has a bad rep of being like a really easy major and definitely not as hard as some of my STEM friends out there. Love you guys. But I think to your point, it's better to have a 4.0 in Comms than a 2.5 in pre-law or chemistry or astrophysics, which was my original career plan. DR. HULTIN: Yeah. I mean, it doesn't mean that a single person cannot get 4.0 in any major, right? CADIE: No, that is very true. DR. HULTIN: You had to be interested in what you're... You're spending four years doing this. You spend a lot of time doing it. And if you're not really into it, you're not going to have a good time. And if you don't have a good time, you're not going to do well. CADIE: Yeah. Well, Dr. Hultin, this has been amazing, but we are at time. These spotlight episodes go so fast. EMMA: Yes. CADIE: Thank you for being here. Here at CHSS Connection, we like to ask all of our guests the same final question. And for the final time with me and Emma on mic, what advice do you have for our listeners? DR. HULTIN: Oh, more advice. CADIE: Because you know, you haven't given enough already. DR. HULTIN: That's a really tough question. And I should say that my son is a freshman at NOVA. So I'm feeling a very that I'm like talking to like his peers, pretty much. EMMA: Yeah, I went to NOVA. That's so fun. DR. HULTIN: Yeah, no, he's really happy there. But I would say, obviously, I've talked a lot of, you know, I think how you should kind of work at Mason. I think the one advice that I think a lot of people will give, and I'm going to reinforce it, and I think it's really important, is like, make sure you have a good social network at Mason, right? Whether that means joining clubs or whatever. I don't know. I mean, I, like a lot of faculty, we sometimes look at the GMU subreddit, right? And kind of see you get a kind of gets like, the temperature of the student body kind of thing. Like, okay, what are people talking about? And of course, a lot of it is about, you know, I don't know, cultural science or something. I don't do that. But it really saddens me how many, what do you call them on subreddits, posts, threads, tweets, no, whatever you call them. They're about like, I have no friends, or how do I make friends and all kind of stuff. And I think and I know it's hard to make friends. And we all just stare at our phones. And it really saddens me when I enter a classroom full of students, and there's 20 students in the classroom, and they all sit at their phones. It used to be you would lean over and say, hey, who are you? What's your major? What are you doing here? That kind of stuff. But I think that's really important. I think, you know, you need to be part of a community. And if you don't have one, you need to make one. And so that I think that that's, I kind of like, that's not your Mason skill. That's like a life skill. But I know that's easier said than done in many times. The other advice I would give is that I and it's a very cliche professor, but one thing that I will enjoy doing is I like to read poetry. You know, I don't teach poetry. I am not a poet. Like I'm not, that's not my thing. You know, my I teach very non poetry stuff. But it's a it's a I have a couple of books by my favorite poets on my coffee table at home. And sometimes just pick them up and flip through them read like one or two poets poems and just it's like a little it's, it's kind of like watching YouTube short or something, but it's actually doesn't feel like it kills your soul and actually nourishes it. So that's my plug for that. CADIE: Yeah. EMMA: As an English major, I think that's a great way to spend your time off your phone. DR. HULTIN: Yeah. EMMA: Yes. Well, Dr. Hultin, thank you so much for joining us. DR. HULTIN: My pleasure. EMMA: If students or alumni would like to reach out to you, how could they do that? DR. HULTIN: The best way is email. So obviously, you have to Google me, but my email is ihultin at gmu.edu. It's confusing because it's an N Hultin, it's ihultin, because my first name is not Niklas, it's something else. And amazing HR is very like, you know, first initial last name. EMMA: Yes, they are. Yeah. Well, thank you very much for being here. And listeners, for the final time, thank you so much for listening to this episode of CHSS Connection. CADIE: Hey, thank you for listening to this episode of CHSS Connection. This podcast is hosted and written by Emma Howard and Cadie Junker. Our audio engineer is Dennis Gabitov. Our supervisor is Eleana Velasco. This podcast is produced by George Mason University's College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Undergraduate Academic Affairs. Special thanks to the Mason Innovation Exchange for their recording studio. The podcast could not happen without them. This project was developed in collaboration with Career Services and the On-Campus Internship Program. If you love the show and want to interact with more of our content, follow us on Instagram @chsspod, or check out the CHSS website, where there's an ongoing library of our episodes. You can also be a potential guest on our podcast. EMMA: If you enjoyed the show and would like to express your support, there are a few things you can do. You can leave a review wherever you are listening to this podcast. You can help by word of mouth, either by telling someone directly who might be interested in the show or posting about it on social media, tagging @chsspod. All these things help support the show, and we appreciate anyone who has done it or will do so in the future. Again, thank you for tuning in to this episode and this season. Although this is my final episode, I hope you tune in to the next season coming September 2026. But until then, stay curious. CADIE: Stay creative! BOTH: And stay connected.