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< Back Brenda's Story Brenda talks about her experience being a daughter to Brazilian immigrants and first generation college student. Brenda describes the transformation in her perspective from once desperately wanting to fit in to typical American standards, to now embracing her Brazilian roots and culture. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 04:01 Both of my parents emigrated from this state in Brazil called Minas Gerais. My Mom came from the capital which is Belo Horizonte and my Dad is from this small, more rustic rural town called Governador Valadares. I didn’t think too much about it in my early, early ages but as I started getting into like third grade, fourth grade, with people, you know, dressing up for St. Patrick's day. And just being like, there is no Brazilian recognition, like really, there would be hispanic heritage month that we kind of talked about and black history month but Brazil is really weird because we are a little bit of everything. Usually, you know, when I am in the sun, I get like very, very tan. And my hair, especially when I was younger, was very long and big and curly and I had bushy eyebrows and I hated that. I really hated that. My best friend growing up was blonde with straight hair and blue eyes. And I would pray to God, like literally this third grader, I would cry to my Mom, and be like why don’t I have blonde hair and blue eyes, why don’t I look the way I want to look and fit this mold that I so desperately wanted to fit in. So at the time, I didn’t realize how badly I wanted to identify myself with something but that's what the issue was is that I often felt like these kind of headline identities, none of them really fit for me. But a lot of that in hindsight came from me trying to push down a lot of these aspects of myself that I feel like made me inauthentic. And it didn’t really, I guess come full circle until I got to UMass, and that's when my bubble really burst. And so my whole floor was filled with hispanic people, black people, caribbean, a very diverse mix of college kids. And when their families would come they would bring their traditional little Brazilian pastries and stuff, like pao de queijo, which is like cheese bread. And I remember this so well that one of the guys Mom came and brought it around for like to everyone on the floor, and that is such a Brazilian thing to do, like if you bring one thing you’re bringing it for everyone, I don’t know, and it just felt like, it was weird, it felt like a piece of home that I got to have at this really scary huge place. And I don't know, I feel like UMass being so big gave me the space to stop the comparison. That was when I was like, oh my god, I can stop being a poser kind of, and try to just relax a little bit, wear my hair natural. I also feel like going through different experiences and really realizing how much my parents sacrificed for me and care about me and show me so much unconditional love that not everyone in college gets to experience made me really appreciate them on a level that I never had. They really raised me with so much warmth, that it is crazy that I ever wanted them to stop being like that and be more American because it was the most nurturing environment. And now it's like, I’m like Mom please cook and yeah, just embracing that aspect also just like, now it’s time to kind of embrace differences. So yeah, I guess just like not thinking so hard about who I am and just being who I am, is what I am doing right now. Previous Next

< Back Taylor's Story Taylor talks about transitioning into UMass as a transfer student and finding her passion for Public Health. She found that public health captures all the things she loves including caring for others. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 02:43 I first intended to go into nursing, so when I was in highschool I was applying to colleges and I only was applying for nursing. So I got into Quinnipiac University for nursing and that’s where I went my freshman year. I wanted to do that because I wanted to do something taking care of people, that was really important to me and I grew up with three younger siblings, I always liked caring for others, especially children. So, I thought that nursing aligned with my beliefs and what I wanted to do. And then I went to nursing school and I didnt love it. So, I just kind of relieved that yes it's helping people but I would rather be on the administrative end and also I didn't love the school that I was going to, I didn’t feel a sense of community. I was trying to find a different school to go to, and my best friend went to school at UMass so I would come and visit her and I ended up liking the school a lot better. So I transferred here but I couldn’t transfer for nursing, and I was still interested in nursing at the time, but I wasn’t completely sold on it yet. So, I transferred and I was like I just want to do something in health care, I don’t really care what it is, So I just kind of picked public health and was like we’ll figure this out and if I need to change programs I will later. And so, I went into public health, my first class was my public health 200 class with Gloria, the professor of this class also, and it was basically an intro to public health and I immediately was like, yep this is what I want to do, this is helping people and doing something in health care, but it’s not nursing and I know that’s not what I want to do. This is exactly what I want. And then, I took a community health development class and I knew that that would be much more of the direction that I would like to go in than nursing. Going into college, or at least me graduating highschool, I had the expectation that I would know what I wanted to do and that I would stick to it and that nothing was gonna change about it, and that I was gonna be a nurse, and you know, graduate and be a nurse. So the fact that didn’t work out, part of me was a little disappointed because I was like, oh I thought this was what I wanted to do, but I think that was part of me figuring out what I wanted to do and who I am. And learning to trust the process, I think was a big thing. And trust yourself! Yeah, definitely. Previous Next

< Back Janice's Story In this story, Janice explains her life long connection to animals and how her experiences working with animals have become her most fulfilling achievements. 00:00 / 03:36 Janice: I have to say I was drawn to animals from the very start of my life. As soon as I—I grew up in the woods basically and explored a lot and can’t remember a time where animals weren’t special to me. I had a parakeet when I was a kid, as an adult I’ve had dogs, cats, rabbits, snakes, turtles, fish, a wonderful rat who traveled around on my shoulder, mice, gerbils, guinea pigs—I’ve might of left something out but you get the picture. When I got to be an adult, I read more, I learned more, and I started to support a lot of animal welfare organizations. And I got older I transitioned from animal welfare to animal rights. And basically, now I think I support both of them. The experience I’ve had with the most depth was also volunteering for a shelter, but this was for their training department. I worked as an assistant trainer for five years. I had just—I just learned so much. I mean, I was essentially was just thrown out to the training and floor and said, “ok now you work with them.” Rebecca: Oh my—what were you working with, dogs? Janice: Oh yes, dogs. Many of which were shelter dogs, and a lot of those owners were kind of really at the end of their rope because they couldn’t get the dog to respond the way the wanted it to and it almost was like we were the last stop before being returned to the shelter. So I realized that my biggest job was to make get the owners to like their dogs, and to get the dogs to trust the owners, and to get them all to realize training was fun. I had an amazing assortment of dogs. In five years, you can imagine—a golden retriever who wouldn’t work at all for treats but would do anything for a hug; a Doberman pinscher who had to do everything behind a curtain because she was so frightened of all the other dogs. I had dogs—little Shih Tzus—who had terrible abuse histories who just tried so hard. They were so earnest and so brave. There was another dog there who was being raised in a bilingual household and we had to say, “Bueno! Bueno!” I was never bored. I was in my element. I became the hotline for my friends and family who were having trouble with their dogs, and I only stopped when I moved away. When I moved away from Massachusetts to Maryland. I do consider it one of the greatest experiences of my life. Rebecca: That sounds so incredible. Janice: I’m proud. Rebecca: You should be. Janice: You know, I’ve had a lot of jobs, a lot of professional positions, and I have two master’s degrees, but when people ask me what I do, well I say I’m a former dog trainer because I’m just so happy that I did that. Previous Next

Camille details her relationship with her siblings and the importance that they play in her life and how they have helped her get through her toughest challenges. Camille's Story Camille details her relationship with her siblings and the importance that they play in her life and how they have helped her get through her toughest challenges. Scroll to listen Camille's Story 00:00 / 04:23 Growing up I went through a lot within my family, through so much of it I felt this large sense of loneliness and this feeling of having to do everything myself and always being alone. But then I realized I have the three most important people in my life standing right next to me the whole time. I have three siblings, who are very close to me in age. My oldest sister's name is Bella, she is currently 23 and she lives in the UK. My youngest sister's name is Josie, she is 20 and she is a sophomore here at UMass Amherst. Then I have a younger brother who is 17, he is a senior in high school. I think having siblings in my life has totally transformed who I am as a person. I think they are the best part of my life. Our parents got divorced which felt like my whole childhood, it felt like this ongoing struggle and battle in my life. So many times, I tried to shield my siblings from it, even though I wasn't the oldest child it always felt like my role in life for some reason. I spent so much time just fighting against things that were just expected to happen, that I feel like I almost lost a part of myself, and it made me have this overwhelming sense of loneliness. I think that has really impacted who I am as a person, and I also think it has led me to be the person I am and to always feel the need to help others or to empathize with other people. Interviewer: “I just so love hearing you talk about your siblings and your relationship with them and somehow there has to be natural sibling rivalry, but you guys do not let that get in the way.” Sibling rivalry thing, I don't know if this is a common theme of siblings but for us it was a lot worse when we were children. I felt like we were all on an equal playing field. I feel like as I have grown up, one of the reasons I first told myself I wouldn't be a doctor was because my older sister is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met in my life. I will commend her for that till the day she dies, she is one of my biggest inspirations in my life, and I feel like the reason why I try too hard to be a better person all around and better at school and better opportunity to connect with people is because of the way my older sister conducts herself. She is like that one person I will always reach out to for advice, we still have our daily phone calls. There was never a said rivalry between us, but I think her being so smart has always not necessarily weighed on me, but it has always been that factor that she is so smart, how can I be so smart… But I think over time I realized that there could be a million smart people in the world. And I think that's one of the reasons me and my siblings get along so well is because I think we each bring our own thing to the table. Even Thanksgiving dinner if we are not all there, something is missing. Separately we each have our own personality, our own ball of energy. As though they're so different from each other, I also feel like they're so similar. People always tell us “Have you guys realized you have the same exact mannerisms?” Like I guess we make the same motions with our hands when we speak. Every time I am with one of my siblings it is like wow you guys are identical. It's funny because I have red hair, my older sister has brunette hair, and my younger sister has blonde hair, so we are not identical in any way shape or form. But sometimes people really can't tell us apart from our mannerisms and the things we say. I think that is so true for us because even though I get to see my older sister two/three times a year now. I still am adapting to things she says, her mannerisms. My younger sister is adapting to both of ours and I just think it's so funny to watch us interact. Even if I do not get to talk to my siblings every day, they are still the biggest part of my life, and it shows in so many more ways than one. They are one thing in my life that makes me feel like it's possible to beat loneliness. Because I remember at any point in my life, even in high school, my loneliest moments, the moments when I was the saddest, like when your first boyfriend breaks up with you, I remember the first thing I think about is always like at least I always have them. They will never leave me. That really means more than the world, is that I can make the biggest mistake and no matter what I do in my life I will always have them. It is the best feeling.

< Back Chad's Story Chad discusses his struggles in elementary school with learning disabilities and how it led him to the development of Sudbury Valley Schools and to the career path of community development. Chad talks about how important being a part of a community is, and how important it is to feel heard and respected in a group. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 02:58 The first question that I have for you is: What was the most difficult part of school for you? You know again there was no special ed then, saying from the front of the room “Ok Chad what’s the answer to number 2? What’s two times nineteen” and I would get red in the face and now, all the other kids are whipping their heads around looking at me, so it was the kids too so. The hardest part was, I guess you would call it sticking out or the change, the change from fitting in and community, to sticking out as there’s something different here, what’s going on. You know, I was called lazy and a lot of those kinds of things until around 13 years old or something, when they diagnosed a bunch of learning disabilities. You know, it’s like any health diagnosis, somebody could take the diagnosis, let’s say alcoholism, they could take that and say “Oh my god I’m broken! This is never going to get better.” Other can take that diagnosis “Hey, now I know I need to watch out for this, how can I work on that.” So as soon as the mind makes that turn, that change, there is benefit. So, by the time I hit high school I had dropped out so, joining that new school in Framingham was the best thing that could have ever happened. I was accepted for who I was no matter what that small part of me was about. I was kind of, I guess you could call it sitting at the boundary. I was neither at the public high school nor at the prep school, but once I started that new school with the others, I was back in the arms of the community. I mean the Sudbury Valley School prepared me for being a member, you know, being someone who had something to give. “We want to hear from you, what’s your take on this, now what about yours.” And I think being a member of that warming school, and the specific model of the school formed a lot of the rest of my life. Previous Next

Samantha talks about her childhood and her appreciation for her Jewish heritage and her understanding of her family history and how it shaped her experiences through life and helped her to face her toughest challenges. Samantha's Story Samantha talks about her childhood and her appreciation for her Jewish heritage and her understanding of her family history and how it shaped her experiences through life and helped her to face her toughest challenges. Scroll to listen Samantha's Story 00:00 / 03:04

< Back Betsy's Story Betsy talks with Brenda about a spontaneous trip that changed her life. She talks about her wonderful experiences and a noteworthy figure that she meets on this trip. Returning from her trip, she decides to pull inspiration from her time away when opening a small store in Northampton. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 04:58 Previous Next

< Back Saddaf's Story Saddaf talks about the role religion played in her life growing up and now, discovering it for herself, she talks about how she struggles with it in college. She touches upon navigating two identities being a first-generation Pakistani Muslim American. 00:00 / 04:57 Previous Next

< Back Sharon's Story Sharon shares about the influence that her hardworking, loving grandmother had on her and how this influence guided her to be the person she is today. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 03:08 Some of the places that we went to, as I say we have traveled around the world, and you realize when you travel that while the architecture and the historic aspects are interesting, it’s the people who make the difference. We’d always try and somehow connect with folks wherever we were and that made it especially nice. It was interesting because you can read forever about different cultures but, until you talk to the people while you are there it isn’t really illuminated, and so the people flesh out the sense you have of the culture. Previous Next

< Back Abby's Story Abby talks about her adventures while traveling. She talks about her experience studying abroad and traveling as a young kid and how that shaped her into the person she is. 00:00 / 04:02 Basically, growing up, traveling was a really big part of my life, one special one that I remember was when I was going into my junior year in high school, they took us to Peru for 3 weeks. For 2 of the weeks we were living on a boat on the Amazon River which was really really cool. We were kind of like helping college students who were doing their thesis or dissertations. We were basically going in and out of the Amazon Rainforest and helping them collect data. It was an awesome experience. It made me look at my life differently, it was my first time traveling without my family. But also while we were there we were able to go to a little village for the day and the villagers just showed us around their homes but we were hanging out with all the little kids and we brought them school supplies and gifts but it was just awesome to see, it was like Christmas day for them when we came they were so excited and that really put a lot of things into perspective because coming from America we just have a lot more things than other countries do, so it was just a really awesome experience and it really shows me a lot about life and how materialistic things like that doesn’t really matter. From that traveling really became my passion, I knew I loved going to new places and experiencing new cultures and seeing different cultures. So, I knew when I came to college, I was going to study abroad no matter what. I went abroad in Fall 2021, and I went to Verona, Italy. It was one of the best experiences of my life. It was my favorite semester in college so far. I was able to travel a ton, I met a lot of new people, I learned so much about myself, I grew as a person. You kind of learn to be comfortable with being uncomfortable if that makes sense, you just are kind of thrown into situations that you usually wouldn’t be in and you kind of just got to figure it out. Like it's been an experience that pushed me so far out of my comfort zone, but it was amazing and so worth it. You just kind of got to learn to just go with the flow and stuff won’t always go the way you planned and that’s okay. My first trip was to Lake Como in Italy. It was one of my favorite trips on that I went on there, it was beautiful and so fun but I think what made it one of my favorite trips was the people I was with and we were just hanging out and having fun and getting to know each other because we were only 3 weeks in so it wasn’t like we knew each other super well. My last trip was to London, basically to London we were just being the biggest tourists you could be. We were doing all the touristy things, we went and saw the London Eye, we saw Great Ben, we saw the Parliament, we saw Buckingham Palace, everything that was stereotypical and touristy about London, we did it. My current job right now which I love is at our study abroad office at UMass. I basically just encourage kids to go abroad and tell them that they can do it, I know it's scary, but you got it. I am working for Teach for America when I graduate, before this year I've always known about it but never thought I'd be able to get in. Previous Next

Eden's Story In this story, Eden’s generous neighbor teaches her a valuable life lesson. The irony of this significant story is unique as the neighbor has no idea of the impact and life shaping this had on Eden. Scroll to Listen Eden's Story 00:00 / 03:47 Growing up both my parents worked. My mom would work later and my dad got out of work around 4 o’clock. So there were a couple of hours in the day after school where I needed someone to watch me and my neighbor, Paula, was the most gracious woman. She’s taught me a lot–definitely an influence from my childhood almost like a second grandmother and I looked up to her so much and loved her. There was a brief period where she couldn’t get me off the bus for about a week or so; I was probably 7 or 8 I can’t really remember but I was young. I remember my parents said ‘Oh, Paula’s sick’ but didn’t really get into anything. I don’t even know if they knew but she had been in the hospital. To this day, I still don’t know what illness she had but she got me off the bus when she was feeling better and I hadn’t seen her for about a week or a couple days, which was rare because I had been seeing this woman every day. So it was weird to not see her for a couple of days. She got me off the bus and we were just talking and I said ‘Oh, Paula, where have you been?’. She said she had been in the hospital and I kind of brushed over it and didn’t really know how to react because I was younger and didn’t know the complexity of certain illnesses. I didn’t ask her how she was doing or if she was feeling any better and it was the first time an adult other than my parents had checked me as a person and kind of put me in a place where I needed to reflect on myself. My parents had done it in more disciplinary ways, but this was deeper than that where it was about self-reflection and how I treat other people. I can remember like it was yesterday… the look on her face, she was so disappointed in me and hurt. She just looked at me and she goes ‘Eden! Are you even going to ask me if I’m doing okay or feeling any better? My heart sank because this was the woman I looked up to so much and loved and adored and would never wish ill on her ever, but she was right. I didn’t know what to say so I looked at her and said ‘I’m so sorry, Paula. Are you feeling better?’ She looked and told me ‘No, Eden, that’s not the point now that you asked. It’s that you knew that I was sick and you didn’t ask if I was feeling better or if I was doing okay and that hurt me because I thought that you would care’. She treated me as an adult, which I respected but it sat with me for a very long time and it definitely taught me this life lesson of how to be a compassionate person because I think when you’re a kid, you have this tendency to just naturally think about yourself and you don’t quite know how to express compassion for other people other than just being a nice person and having respect and treating others the way you want to be treated but I think compassion goes deeper than that. There are always going to be situations in life where you don’t really know what the right thing is to say, and I think about this memory when I go into situations like that when I know someone needs that extra support and compassion. You know, it’s better to say something than nothing at all and it's an important lesson that she taught me. She doesn’t even know that she did this and probably didn’t think much of it after the fact, but it’s just always stuck with me!

< Back Caleigh's Story Caleigh reflects on the importance of becoming a role model for her five-year-old niece, Natalie. Being there for her as she grows up is something extremely important to Caleigh. 00:00 / 02:37 Caleigh: I just love stories in general anyways because it makes people who maybe would have never interacted realize their shared humanities. I just want say a story that I heard in class—It was a story in class about a young man who welcomed a little brother into his world, and he realized that this world was no longer about him and he wasn’t just a big brother, he was a role a model. Everything he accomplished and everything he strived for wasn’t only for himself but to set a good example for his brother. When I read that story in class it made me think of my five-year-old niece, Natalie, and we are very close. She’s my whole world, I love her so much. After reading that story, I took a step back and I was like, “who am I as an auntie and how does she see me?” She looks up to me, she mimics me, she wants to be just like me, she always wants to spend time with me, and it made me think about what kind of person do I want her looking up to? I am no longer just an auntie, but I am setting a good example for her. I want to show her that she is capable of anything she sets her mind to. I am the first one in my family to go to college and I would love to be a role model for her to see, you know, auntie goes to college, and I can do it and I want to be just like her. And through just reading that story of the man—the boy—who welcomed his brother in the world, it just connected me and him and we’ve never met. I hope that everything that I’ve learned in my 20 and a half years—today is my half birthday—I want to share those experiences with her so that she doesn’t make some of the mistakes that I’ve made, but also that she can follow in my footsteps because I feel like I am a great role model for her. That’s—you know—I have two older brothers. I never really had a female role model, other than my mom, someone that was closer to my age, so in a way we are so close, and I’ve been with her since she was in the womb. Previous Next