Experiential Learning
Foster Rome, Summer B Term 2019
In my original application I mentioned that I was looking forward to learning independence in an environment entirely different from the one that I am used too. I feel as though that lesson was one of the most important of my time in Rome. From the first week, we fell into a clear routine. We spent Monday through Thursdays in Rome for classes, company visits, and local exploration. Our weekends were spent exploring the varied regions and cultural attractions of Italy. It was during the third weekend of our program that I traveled with a group of twelve friends to Florence. After two weekends of previous travel experience, we were feeling comfortable with our routine of planning our weekend trips Thursday night, then hopping on the train to our chosen destination early Friday morning. Following that pattern, we arrived in Florence around ten in the morning and spent the day exploring the city, and visiting the nearby city of Pisa. We returned from Pisa that evening, and went to check into the Airbnb we had booked the night before. Upon arrival, we found a locked apartment with no sign of the owner, who was supposed to let us in. After somewhat frantically trying to contact the Airbnb host for the better part of an hour, we finally managed to reach her. In a conversation made up of broken English and our very limited Italian, we discovered that we had accidentally booked the Airbnb for the wrong nights. In the moment, it felt like a disaster. There was no possible way we could find affordable accommodations for twelve people on a Friday evening, in an unfamiliar city, in the peak of tourist season, when we spoke little to no Italian. But something had to be done. We didn’t panic and some relatively quick research gave us some options. In less than fifteen minutes we found a hostel that could accommodate all of us, in the heart of the city. Despite the unexpected obstacle of finding last minute accommodations for our large group, Florence turned out to be one of my favorite weekends. My biggest takeaway from this experience, and the program as a whole, is that I want to spend more of my life pursuing new and different experiences. When I am in Seattle, I feel as though I can get stuck in my comfort zone. I notice opportunities that interest me, but I don’t always go after them because they require that I take a chance and make myself vulnerable. During my six weeks abroad, I realized that if I am able to plan multiple excursions across a country where I have a significant language barrier, and embark on the trip mere hours after planning it, then there is no reason that I can’t make the most of opportunities I receive in Washington, where I’ve lived my entire life.
My second takeaway is that when I enter the business world, and begin working for a company, I want to work for a company that has strong, well defined values. One of my favorite parts of the academic program was the company visits. All the organizations that we visited were extremely value driven. The UNFAO shared with us their sustainable development goals; we learned about the values and culture behind family run organizations at Tabarrini Winery; and Certified Origins taught us the importance of quality and traceability. Because these organizations have such a strong grasp on what they are trying to do as companies, they are all the more successful at achieving their goals, while maintaining a positive working environment for employees and a compelling rapport with customers. Having the opportunity to interact with these organizations in a business setting also allowed me to challenge the vision I have for my own future. Before this summer, I always imagined myself graduating and getting some form of marketing job in Seattle. And while I still think that I would love that if it were the path that I choose to take, interacting with the business world on a more global level allowed me to realize that there are opportunities worth pursuing outside of what I originally believed to be possible.
My last takeaway from my program was that the people you surround yourself with have a huge amount of control over the type of experience you will have while abroad. On my program, I met more than a dozen people who significantly contributed to shaping my time abroad. The people I went on this amazing trip with made it even more incredible than I could have imagined. Sometimes it felt like we could not possibly squeeze one more activity or excursion into our hectic schedule. These people helped push me to maximize my time abroad and take advantage of the opportunities to the fullest. They were also there to talk about what we were experiencing and how it relates to our lives and studies back in Seattle. In so many ways, the people I was with really made the trip memorable and an experience I won’t forget for all the right reasons.
Overall, this project connects to my future coursework and the remainder of my time at UW by being a stepping stone to encourage me to be more active and involved in my community. Since returning to school, I have been lucky enough to connect with so many of the people I met on my study abroad program, and they’ve helped push me to continue challenging myself. Because of the friends I have made on my program, in the last month I have joined a new RSO, signed up to participate in a case competition for the Foster School of Business, had people to study with for classes, and gone on a few other different adventures. Studying abroad was an amazing experience for so many reasons and I really hope that I have the opportunity to travel abroad again before I graduate college.
Looking back on my original experiential learning application, I would say that the answers I gave to the questions were accurate to the overall experience. However, when I was writing them I do not think I realized just how much I would take away from my study abroad. Not only did I return with over one thousand pictures, an envelope full of museum and train tickets, and two completed business classes. But I returned with new confidence, a desire to see more of the world, and a best friend who continues to encourage me to take on new experiences.
