My STEP signature project was a Study Abroad experience from May 25-June 24, 2016. I lived in Barcelona with a host family and 4 other Study Abroad students during this month, and I earned 6 credit hours towards my Spanish major at Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo.
I completed this experience through ISA (International Studies Abroad), and I could not be happier with the wonderful memories I made working with this fantastic third party provider. I was welcomed into the city with a cohort of around 30-40 other ISA students from colleges across the United States, and the staff in Barcelona could not have been more kind, accommodating or fun to work with. Along with the unforgettable and valuable experience that I gained living with a Catalonian family and attending a university in Barcelona with my fellow ISA students and a native professor, there were incredible weekend excursions with ISA to some incredible sights. We traveled to beach towns along Spain’s majestic Costa Brava, dived into the Mediterranean Sea off of a yacht, explored the southern and historic coastline of France, toured a family owned Cava vineyard, roamed through ancient cities where Game of Thrones filmed, hiked breathtaking mountain ranges, explored an Olympic stadium and had incredible walking tours through iconic attractions and museums right in Barcelona itself. On our free weekend, one of my friends and I took a train into Madrid to do some exploring, shopping and to visit a friend also studying abroad with Ohio State through a different program.
My views of the world around me changed so much during the month I spent living in Europe. My views of Iberian Spanish and Spain as a whole developed incredibly, and now I am so interested in learning more about and investing myself into the Iberian culture. Before traveling to Spain, my knowledge of the other indigenous languages to the country and its states was very limited, and living in Barcelona certainly opened my eyes to an entirely new language that I knew very little about, but also a political unrest and social climate that I was completely oblivious to. Barcelona is a very touristic city on the Northeastern coast of Spain in the State of Catalonia, which borders the Mediterranean Sea. In Catalonia, the primary spoken language is Catalan. All of the street signs, menus, media and written word in Barcelona is in Catalan. However, because it is still a unified state under the Spanish federal government and monarchy, Spanish is spoken there as well and enforced as the national language. I also was able to learn about the Catalonia Independence movement going on over there as we speak; my host parents happened to be quite active in the movement as they are very outspoken professors and journalists.
A piece of my heart is left in Barcelona. I made so many amazing friends from other universities and my heart and soul is so connected with the amazing city that I was lucky enough to call my home for 30 days. My host family was gracious and the people were very warm and friendly. I have never before been somewhere with such rich, ancient history. I loved that I had the most passionate professor for my two classes, and I was afforded the incredible opportunity of going out and traveling to all of the places we discussed in my classes.
Barcelona gave me so many opportunities to step outside of my comfort zone. Not only did I get to assimilate to very different cultural and social norms, I was able to pick up portions of a brand new language as well and learn about its origins. I also am so much more aware of the politics within Spain and I continue to follow the independence movement as it unfolds and parallels with the refugee crisis overseas.
This experience is so incredible valuable as I seek to one day become a bilingual educator. My majors are Early Childhood Education and Spanish, and once I complete my dual degree I hope to earn my Master of Education in Foreign Language Ed. so that I am licensed to teach Spanish as well. I hope to teach all subject in both languages (English and Spanish) to young children in immersion schools one day, and now I know more than ever that I would be so willing to live in Spain in order to fulfill this dream if I had the opportunity. I will never forget the instrumental role this trip had in my professional and personal development towards language fluency in Spanish and my growing cultural awareness. I am endlessly grateful and would recommend the Barcelona experience to anyone!
