Vocation

The biggest way in which I will take advantage of my time abroad is to take classes in Spanish. Acquisition of the Spanish language is my biggest goal for my semester abroad. Having knowledge of another language will not only improve my chances of getting a job after graduation but will also open the door to learning more languages. I will also become more aware of cultural differences and cultural practices that differ from my own during my time there. My experience abroad will help me to increase my knowledge overall of Argentina. The best thing I will do to take advantage of my time abroad will be to work on gathering data for my thesis. To do this, I plan on visiting different types of businesses, for example, restaurants and retail stores, and observing how relationships are formed between management and customers. I want to see how this is done differently in Argentina than in America. I will come back and use this data to work on my thesis. I will be able to integrate my experiences in businesses abroad into a comparison between customer service here and there. By doing this, I will gain the experience of talking with professionals and interviewing them. I will be able to use this comparison later on, after graduation, to guide how I will do business abroad by representing a company. I will have a deep understanding of how to adapt to a different culture from my own and thrive within it. This is the biggest and best thing I will do during my time abroad.

Besides that idea, I will be able to incorporate my experience abroad into my everyday life by looking at my own culture differently. I will have a different lense to observe my own culture through.