Sophomore Anna Ventura’s home is in Italy, but she had the opportunity to live in the U.S. and go to school here for this year and also next year. 

Ventura has learned many new things but also faced challenges here as well. 

“Even though I can say that I know English pretty well, there is still a bit of a language barrier when I have to express myself about some topics,” she explained. “Another difficulty I faced is that trying to get used to a new environment is always tricky at first, but as time goes on I got familiar with mostly everything.”

Ventura experienced new lifestyles and had to adapt to waking up earlier, although she explained that “life in general is also more calm and definitely less rushed.” 

Ventura got to see the U.S. through her own perspective and quickly learned to appreciate her home country and the U.S. 

Overall the sophomore has had a pretty positive experience here as she says, “About Americans, I will say that they certainly are very warm and welcoming people, that care and have a lot of respect for their country and for the people that live there, and they appreciate it a lot.” 

Continuing, she explained, “I am loving the school, and everyone is very nice, and about the U.S., I will definitely miss my new friends once I eventually go back home.” 

Ventura is planning to go home for a couple months in the summer but is planning to come back again for her junior year. 

To get involved with the NDA community, she joined tennis this fall and met many friends through that. 

Because she only went home during Christmas break, she misses her relatives and friends back home and has learned to appreciate them more now. 

“I appreciate my country even more than before now, as I am reminded every day of what my daily life looks like, especially in spring, where the weather is definitely hotter than spring here,” Ventura stated. 

Ventura hopes to inspire other high school students to take this opportunity if they can because it has been an eye-opening experience.