Think beyond ...

Senior
Major: Spanish

Q. I hear you are quite the world traveler!
A. Ever since I was young, I have done a lot of traveling with my family. I actually chose to come to Drew because it offers so much opportunity for international travel. Through Drew, I have been able to travel to Egypt and Spain for study and to Honduras—three times!—for volunteer work.

Q. Egypt! Pretty exotic. Tell me about that.
A. The trip to Egypt was with my classmates in a Drew International Seminar called Religion and Society in Modern Egypt. One component of the class was a month-long study program in Egypt with our professor, Christopher Taylor. We went all over—Cairo, Luxor, Aswan and Sinai. It was an amazing experience! Dr. Taylor has many contacts in Egypt, so we were able to meet with some important people, like members of parliament and the Grand Sheik of Al-Azhar, the most important Islamic university in the world. We also attended lectures at Islamic universities and saw the Coptic Pope celebrate the Christmas Eve service. We met with local people and saw things tourists never see. I left with a great understanding of the role of religion in Egyptian culture.

Q. And your next stop—Spain?
A. That was a study abroad experience in Seville, Spain, during the spring semester of my junior year. My goal was to come back a better speaker of Spanish, so I lived with a host family and enrolled at the Cross-Cultural Center for Study, where I had to sign a contract not to speak English. I spoke only Spanish all day, both at school and at home with my host family. I had a course in art history that was amazing. The professor would talk about some great work of Spanish art and then say, “OK, let’s walk outside and see it.” 

Q. And did you come back a better speaker of Spanish?  
A. Yes! In fact, I knew that my Spanish had improved when I was asked to serve as a translator when I went to Honduras that summer.

Q. You’ve been to Honduras three times as a volunteer, right? Can you tell me about that? 
A. Each summer I volunteer in a school for underprivileged boys through the Drew Honduras Project. We get up early in the morning, eat with them, help with their chores, play cards or soccer or dominoes with them. We pitch in with projects like painting the dorms or digging trenches for waterlines. But the important thing is to show them that we care and open them to the idea of education. It’s amazing—they remember you each time you come back. It’s been such a great experience that I’m sad to be graduating; it means I won’t be going back again.
 
Q. Has all this international travel influenced your life plans?
A. Absolutely; there is such great need in Latin-American countries. After graduation, I plan to work for a year with Teach For America or AmeriCorps—I’ve applied to both—and, in five years, I hope to be an international social worker serving Spanish-speaking people outside of the United States.