Classes in Florence have been super enjoyable for me, and all of them have been super engaging! While I am not doing an internship this semester, I have been learning lots of new things from my classes. As a business analytics and supply chain management major, there are no business classes being offered here that contribute to my majors. Therefore, I have been taking gen eds that I wouldn’t have the opportunity to take at Pitt. My classes this semester are Italian, Beginning Figurative Sculpture, Beginning Oil Painting, and Analyzing and Exploring the Global City: Florence.

Fortunately for me, I already took 6 years of Italian classes in high school, and was certified as bilingual by the end of my senior year. And although my skills are rusty and I needed some refreshers, it is definitely beneficial to have that background. I am the only student in my class that has experience in Italian, and it has made the class much easier and enjoyable for me. My professor, Martina, is super energetic and fun, and clearly loves her job a lot. She likes to joke around and have fun with the lessons, and makes us sing and dance to some of her favorite Italian songs at the end of every class. It’s also nice that our Italian classes are mostly Pitt students, many of whom I was friends with beforehand, so none of us are shy and we can have fun together.

If I had to choose, my favorite class so far would be sculpture. It’s a class I never thought I would be able to take as a business major, but I am so lucky I am now. Our professor is an experienced Italian sculptor, who has many impressive projects that he showed us pictures of. He is very helpful in guiding us and giving us tips when working on our projects, and he’s fostered a comfortable environment in which we can all talk and have fun while we work with our clay. On the first day, we had the opportunity to make whatever we pleased, so I made a model of my own hand. In the following weeks, we have sculpted different body parts, such as eyes and noses. We are now working on making models of another classmate’s head, so I am in the progress of sculpting my roommate Jack. This week, we walked across the river to the professor’s studio, where he and his colleagues demonstrated how to make teapots, which we began work on as well.. Sculpting has been very calming and cathartic, and it’s become something that I look forward to every week.

I’m excited to see what else my classes have in store for the remainder of the semester. Thanks for following along, ciao!