Please share a description of your research.

My paper concerned a Roman leader named Gaius Marius, who flourished around the year 100 BC and has been credited with a sweeping set of changes in Roman politics and the military. I looked at the long-standing idea that he caused a major change in the army by removing the requirement for soldiers to own land and thereby single-handedly creating what has been called an “army of the poor.” Historians in the late 19th century and the early part of the 20th century believed this was a major reason for the civil wars in the 1st century BCE, because these poor soldiers now had more of an attachment to their generals than to the state. Scholars came to think that Gaius Marius made this change single-handedly and permanently, and that it’s one of the biggest factors contributing to how people like Caesar and Pompey and others were able to use their armies for their own personal gain. I've heard this for years, and it's still shown in books today. I wanted to look at what the sources say, and I found that the main ancient sources from around that time or shortly after do in fact say that he did enlist what they called ‘poor people’ – so propertyless citizens – but they do not say that he replaced the whole model. In addition, there are sources which are often overlooked from about 60 years later which show that most soldiers were still citizens with land, and that “poor soldiers” were still the exception to the rule. The underlying point of the paper was basically that we must question those established paradigms. It’s not so much to undermine other people's research and work, but it should never just be taken as a given that, because a scholar 100 years ago said something happened, that it happened in that way.

How did you become interested in this area of research?

One of the things that I'm always interested in is looking closely at our established interpretations of history and questioning them or looking at them in a different way. Last year, even though I won in the same category, that research was more about early medieval history using archeology. This time around, it's related directly to classics using literary sources. That’s kind of a departure for me, because I'm not typically focused on literature, but I like referring to ancient literature when it informs about history, and that's really what this was about.

Why did you decide to submit to the Global Undergraduate Awards for a second time?

Although winning an award is a nice feather in your cap, and I know that having won the award last year factored into me being accepted to my master's program, a big reason for submitting another paper this year was because of the experience I had at the Global Summit last year. Having the opportunity to connect with people from around the world and learn about their research was incredible. I'm really passionate about this program now based on that experience. I've been telling everyone to apply!

Do you have any advice for someone considering applying?

I tell people to submit the maximum submissions allowed and to submit to multiple categories, if they can. I thought another paper I submitted this year would do better than the one that actually won. So, you never know.

What are you looking forward to this year at the Global Summit?

I’ve had the opportunity to become pretty involved with the program this year, as a result of having attended the Summit last year. I am also generally a fair bit older than other students, so I like to take people on field trips and make sure they’re taken care of. I was asked to do that in a more formal way this year, so I’ll be representing Western International at the event. This will include giving a presentation and answering questions about graduate programs while I’m there, in addition to taking part in the other sessions and networking events.

Why are programs like the Global Undergraduate Awards valuable?

In my opinion, generally, in academia, there doesn't seem to be a lot of interest in the work that undergraduates do. There's sort of this unwritten rule that until you get to your master’s, you're not really producing anything valuable. But, the Global Undergraduate Awards takes the approach that there's definitely value in what undergraduates are doing. And having been there last year, I can tell you that some of the work I saw absolutely blew my mind. I've been to a lot of conventions and summits over the years and sometimes there's a lot of competition, and other times it's this feeling of forced positivity. There was none of that at the Global Summit – it’s just genuine. The people were amazing. I not only connected with a lot of people but have kept in contact with most of the folks I met. As a matter of fact, I woke up the morning after this year’s winners were announced to a whole bunch of messages in a chat group that had been created for the 2023 Summit attendees. Many of the people I met at last year’s Global Summit had seen the post that I'd won again, and they all messaged me to congratulate me. It’s wonderful to have made so many connections with people from around the world.