I always thought it was too hard and there was no way that I was ever going to be fluent in the language, although I always wanted to be. I took a college-level Spanish course my senior year of high school and on the exam at the end of the year I received a one out of five, the worst grade you could get, and I was about to study Spanish in college. I immediately emailed my advisor at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, New York and told her that there was no way I would ever be able to get a degree in Spanish. She told me to just try it out and have confidence in myself and that I would get to the level I desired. So, I gave it a shot. I had the most difficult professor ever my first semester, but I got through it and stuck with itm and today I can officially say I am bilingual. From then on, I knew never to doubt myself and that if there was something I wanted to achieve, I could. I just had to put in the work.
Le Moyne College is a Jesuit school and had many opportunities for service trips for students. I was so nervous about applying for an international service trip, but I got up the courage and applied to one during my freshman year. It was a service trip to Kingston, Jamaica, where I would travel for two weeks and help teach in a local school. I couldn't believe it when the committee said I got in. It was a very challenging experience, but I learned that there is so much more to the world than what I thought, and I wanted to learn all that I could about other cultures and languages. I ended up returning to Jamaica the following year on the same trip and then I went to Quito, Ecuador my senior year to do the same thing.
To earn my degree in Spanish, I was recquired to study abroad in a Spanish-speaking country for four months.
