My name is Liam Astorga, and I am participating on an exchange program at ETH Zurich in Switzerland during the fall of 2023. I am an environmental resource science major with a minor in environmental law. I plan on going to law school after graduation and then working either in policy writing, environmental social governance, or private sector conservation. I am an avid outdoorsman and particularly like hiking, fishing, and birding. During the summers I work as the nature specialist of a YMCA family camp where I teach youth and adults a wide variety of topics related to ecology, conservation, or outdoorsmanship. I am currently working there and when the summer is finished I will be traveling almost directly to Europe.
At ETH Zurich I am planning on taking classes related to international environmental policy and law as well as a few interesting science classes like agroecology. I have taken an environmental law and an environmental policy class at UGA so the content will be somewhat familiar, but I am excited to learn about solutions to the same environmental issues through a different lens. ETH Zurich is primarily a tech school so I am interested to learn the ways they approach science and to see if it is different than at UGA.
While abroad, I am certainly planning on traveling across Switzerland and to as many other countries as possible. I have never been skiing, so one thing on my bucket list is to ski in the Alps. Another item on my bucket list is to fish in alpine lakes and to catch as many new species of fish as I can. I have heard that hiking and then cold water plunging is a popular activity in Switzerland, so I definitely plan on doing that many times.
Excited for the semester and hope to keep the blog updated with my travels and experiences.
