Cynthia Gomez ’24 (she/her/hers)

Studying in Córdoba, Spain as part of PRESHCO (Programa de Estudios Hispánicos en Córdoba.) 

“One of the classes I’m taking is archaeology. I really like it because we get to go on excursions and we get the opportunity to see Roman ruins … There is this one store that I go to here called Bershka and our professor once said ‘hey, let’s go to Bershka,’ and we asked, ‘are you gonna go shopping?’ And they said ‘No, there’s ruins down there.’  It’s crazy because there’s definitely a lot of history here. There are ruins everywhere but people wouldn’t even know about it unless they are an archaeology major or something. And I am majoring in Biology so this was really interesting to me.”

Isabel (Isa) Martinez ’24 (she/her/hers) 

Studying in Bologna, Italy 

“The way that university works in Italy is very different because … it’s not really a four year program, it’s however long it takes you to finish your classes, which for someone, could be three and for others, it could be seven. It really depends on what their lifestyle is and how many classes they want to take. Whatever your program is, it has different requirements, so there’s a lot of people of different ages taking classes and they’re really big classes in auditoriums. It is very different from Wellesley and I wanted to have a different experience outside of Wellesley for my college experience.

“My favorite part [about the program] so far is the balance of social life and academics because at Wellesley, I feel our student life is very academically focused and then everything else is kind of on the side. But in this program, it is very much about your social life, and your interests are kind of centered around it … I definitely spend a lot of time with my friends like going out to dinner, going out to bars. We also spend time together studying, but I think it’s just a much healthier work life balance, and the people in the program are awesome. There’s about 24 of us and we all get along really well.”

Izzy Liu ’24 (she/her/hers) 

Studying at Oxford University 

“What is great about the visiting student program at Oxford is that it’s very intercollegiate because while we apply to particular colleges under University of Oxford, we’re all cross connected amongst each other … We take classes with people at Hartford College that come from different universities apart from Wellesley, and we’ve all become really close friends. So we’ve developed not only a social network but a network that allows us to ask questions and answer them. So you can get to know what’s up with the social calendar that week or how to pick up your mail or go about shipping something to myself.

“In addition, the support system at Oxford is great. They are really dedicated to making our stay as smooth and comfortable as possible, whether that is the visiting student director or what’s called the Porter’s Lodge which is sort of like the front desk equivalent of a hotel to answer any questions you might have.”