This past week my first day of school was on a Wednesday. Back home its a dream come true when the teacher gives us a day off or even a break from homework. But here I can’t stand just sitting there and watching them learn. In fact it gets boring after a while because they don’t expect anything from you. I start to school at 7:30am and I get out around 12pm because a typical college student has to work the other half or the day or spend their time at training. I enjoy the thought of having the rest
of the day off, but coming back my senior year, the school day is going to seem like an eternity. My school is known for students that are good with technology or want to become a mechanic. My classes are in normal subjects, but the topics taught in the class are gibberish to me because I have not been studying Sociology or Physics. Its hard enough in a new language. I am basically attending a semester at a university for my junior year because here “junior year” they study for “the biggest test of their lives.” For those of you that have never heard of this before its a test about every subject out you learn in school and the more you pass helps them get into college. So as an exchange student only studying here in school for a semester its pointless if I spend it studying for a test I won’t even take. So instead of re-taking my sophomore year, I am enrolled in a level higher (senior year).
The reason I only have a semester of my junior year is because the school year is opposite ours. If you are not aware here in Brasil summer is December, January and February so arriving here in August I missed the whole first semester of school. I know your thinking well how could that possibly work out for me to still have enough credits to graduate in 2018? My resolution is taking 2 online classes throughout this year. Summit High School will recognize the classes I take here as a half a credit for every class I pass. those credits will transfer back to Summit so I will also have a full schedule my senior year instead of off periods.
Here is Curitiba there are 4 universities. The students here typically still live with their parents because they all stay here in their city to finish college as well. On my campus, the classrooms are very plain walls with typical student desks, a chalkboard, and projector. They all look the
same. The picture on your right is a picture of the way they number the rooms. I can’t compare that to other universities in Colorado because I haven’t gone to college, yet, but compared to Summit High it’s not normal for me. The classrooms are empty because the teachers move around from building to building just as much as us. Many students do not speak English in my school, at least they are shy to speak up when the teachers introduce me. So for those that try to get to know me, I type their sentence into the translator… but the daily questions I seem to get are “Do you smoke weed in Colorado? Are you voting for Trump or Hillary? Why did you choose Brasil? And How long are you here?” Not very many teachers can speak English either but as I present myself to them they are super welcoming, I can’t say its easy to understand what they say because of my Spanish, but it certainly helps. Each class is with a new set of people so I can’t seem to find one person I have multiple classes with. On the bright side, I will have friends in a bunch of different groups.
