My sophomore fall this year has been very enjoyable at Middlebury College. I live in a beautiful building called Pearsons that overlooks the Adirondack Mountains with one of my best friends, which has made this semester much more easygoing. I spent a lot of time this semester working on the internship process and figuring out what I want my major to be, which has contributed greatly to learning who I am and what interests me most. I have a newfound passion for environmental studies and am pursuing that in my future class this spring of social environmental justice. I also have spent a lot of my time and effort on my sport, track and field, running around our campus and through the trails around Middlebury and welcoming in and getting to know our new freshmen. This semester, I was enrolled in an American politics class, an ethnography of organizations class, an environmental and conservation studies class, and an art class. This group of classes was definitely challenging, but they helped me think in different ways and develop skills in areas like art, writing, analysis, and understanding how our country works. I declared my major in Political Science and I’m excited to explore what opportunities that will bring me in the future. In this major, the classes are difficult, but that’s one of the reasons I felt this major would be beneficial to me. When things are challenging, it makes me work harder at them to better my understanding and create my own thoughts on those topics. I want to thank and appreciate the MVYouth community for being so helpful and encouraging my learning. I am looking forward to my upcoming semester and continuing to work toward my major in Political Science. I have loved my time at Middlebury College, where I get to make lots of lifelong friends and be able to attend college in such an outstanding place.

My first fall semester at Middlebury College was an eye-opening and joyful experience. Throughout this semester, the staff and students were all so welcoming and I never felt that I was alone once, which is something that I’m really grateful for. Our freshman orientation week at the beginning of the semester was very impactful because I made some of my best friends during it. During this fall, I started up my Track & Field practices with my team which I had been really looking forward to. The team was so welcoming to the freshman and I felt accepted right away. Everyone was coming back from the summer and we all supported each other as we got back up to where we wanted to be for our upcoming Indoor Track season. I am so excited to be able to continue to get to know my teammates and to compete on such a supportive team. This semester I also took four classes that were quite challenging and out of my comfort zone. These included 19th Century British Literature, an Introduction to Pre-Modern World Architecture, an Introduction to Political Philosophy, and my freshman seminar, A Culinary History of Italy. Some of these classes were things I loved, like the literature class, but the others were subjects I knew nothing about. I ended up loving my architecture class and learning so much about the history of our world in terms of the many different types of architecture. However, my political philosophy class ended up being very difficult and extremely out of my comfort zone. In the end, I was glad that I took it because I learned so much about the basis of politics and discovered that maybe I could use this class to find where my interests lie. A lot of people worry about missing their homes and families when going away to college, but once you immerse yourself in the environment and people around you, for me at least, I didn’t feel as alone. I just want to thank MVYouth for giving me this incredible opportunity to explore my interests and learn at a school that I’ve dreamed of attending. The support MVYouth gave me was so needed and much appreciated.