Alexander Noel Tokarev is studying Sport Management at Northwood University. A student-athlete from Midland, Michigan, Noel has authored many thought-provoking pieces for Students in Defense of Freedom, an annual collection of student essays, and When We Are Free, Northwood’s signature publication dedicated to the importance of free enterprise.
Just 50 years ago, China was one of the poorest countries on Earth. Many of its people lived in mud-brick homes. Most were undernourished. Everyone was trapped in a rigid communist system that crushed initiative. Today, it is the world’s second-largest economy by some measures, home to gleaming megacities and the largest middle class by...
By A. Noel Tokarev, Kristin Tokarev, Li Schoolland, Adriel Sanchez, Nathan Kniesteadt
The following Student View by Barrett Tefft, Anthony Storer, and Alexander “Noel” Tokarev appears in the April 2025 When Free to Choose, a signature publication by Northwood University. Some see immigration as a human right. If that’s true, we need open borders. Others say the failure of the previous administration to stop the flow of...
The eyes of the world are focused on the White House where President Donald Trump’s return is a harbinger of very significant and consequential changes in America’s international trade policies. The President of the United States demanded major economic and political concessions from China, Mexico, Canada, and the European Union which, if not satisfied promptly,...
Americans are praying for tens of thousands of families who lost relatives and homes in the devastating fires in Los Angeles. Governor Newsom and Mayor Bass face criticism for prioritizing the well-being of fish over people, for misguided environmentalist policies that effectively turned the local forests into a tinderbox, and for diverting state and local...
By Noel Tokarev, Konner Lauria and John Michelotti During the 2024 Politics, Philosophy, and Economics League Competition at Ottawa University in Kansas, we were asked to evaluate a proposal to replace the paper dollar (and our coins) with a digital currency. It was part of a competition where contestants had to approach their evaluations from...
Wasn’t the Constitution written for a different time? Does that not require that we update it in accordance with our current needs? Should we sit idle while it protects hateful, racist, sexist, nationalist, and right-wing extremists? Do I have your undivided attention? Before you heap praises on democracy, consider that under it, any one of...