Daily Lobo Spotlight

A.J. Tongate

Junior

Psychology and

communication

Daily Lobo: What's the most interesting psychology class you've taken so far?

A.J. Tongate: Positive psychology.

DL: What was that about?

AT: Encouraging positive characteristics instead of focusing on what's wrong with people. It develops what's good

with us.

DL: What do you find interesting about that?

AT: Because I think a lot of sociology and psychology classes are focused on what's going wrong with us. Instead of focusing on what we can do to make things better, it focuses on deviance.

DL: What would you like to do when you graduate?

AT: Travel, and I'm going to go to grad school for peace education.

DL: What do you hope to do with a graduate degree in peace education?

AT: Teach peace and create peace. Work on an international level.

DL: Is there any particular country you'd like to focus on?

AT: I think we need to focus on America and change American

politics and American foreign policy. And once I can set an example, I think America tries to stand out as a beacon for hope and freedom and democracy, but we do it in really (expletive)-up ways, like under-the-table wars and (expletive) that a lot of people don't know about. I hope to just really create an atmosphere of peace and community.

DL: Who would you like the next president to be?

AT: From the local perspective, I think (Bill) Richardson would be good just because he's done a lot for the New Mexico economy and a lot for education, and he's worked a lot with international relations previously. So, I think he'd have a good foreign policy versus Clinton - Bill Clinton - who did a lot domestically but wasn't so good on foreign policy. Bush is just all around (expletive)-up.

DL: What's the best communication class you've taken so far?

AT: Intercultural communication. I think nonverbal communication is very good, as well.

DL: What do you learn in nonverbal communication?

AT: Basically, everything you communicate aside from verbal, explicit verbal contexts. So, it could be the clothes you wear, the environment. It's really interesting to walk into a place and start to analyze it and what people are trying to present before they even say a word.

DL: So, what am I saying right now?

AT: I'm not quite sure. I'm still taking (the class).

DL: What do you dislike about college?

AT: In terms of UNM, I think that the classes (and) the teachers are really good, and they've got a lot of really good ideas. They're not necessarily able to express it. So, I feel very limited at this school.

DL: What can UNM do to fix it?

AT: My positive psychology class is a 450. It's special topics. I've had a lot of frustration in the lower level. Developmental psychology classes are really frustrating because I think it's a good class, but the way they present the information is just not very conducive to learning. It's more like reiteration of facts, instead of, "Let's explore this and figure out how it works."

~Jeremy Hunt