Ana dos Santos Lagarto

Lisbon, Portugal
United World College Maastricht
Bachelor of Science Psychology Neuroscience
Class of 2022

I chose to come to Bishop’s mainly due to the intimate community atmosphere that is used to describe the place. Coming from an international boarding school with only 200 students, a big university did not seem appealing. Choosing to come to Bishop’s was a choice that I made together with my family and it has not disappointed!

The thought of going to university scared me. I don’t think we are ever truly ready and the way it had been portrayed by my family and school counsellors in the past made it somewhat scary. I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t know if I was going to like it. However, every so often, you take that leap of faith, and it ends up being one of the best adventures of your life. To be honest, I thought I would struggle during my first year. New country, new environment, new ways of learning, new classmates. As much as I love change, because it makes us grow, it also scares me. Somehow, once I got the hang of where classes were and that professors were there to help you with whatever you need, things became easier. Professors have open door policies which means that if we see them around we can always approach them with any questions we have about the subject. This made me thrive in my first semester.

Over the past year I have been involved in the Leadership Community through residence and I am organizing my first campus event. This event will focus on further integrating our domestic and international communities so that we are even more aware of our cultural differences. Personally, never once have I felt insulted or felt lesser-than because I come from somewhere else. There are so many other people on our campus that come from all sorts of interesting and amazing places that it is important to keep in mind that we have all been raised in different ways. I want to make this tight little BU community to further connect and learn more about each other.

As small as Bishop’s is, I still find it amazing to see so many new faces every day and how I’m beginning to recognise them as time goes by. I can’t wait to meet more of those new faces and see what I can do for the duration of my time here at Bishop’s!