Both worked in the mornings and took Spanish lessons in the afternoon - a perfect balance, says Ruth, who loved her internship from day one.
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They stayed together with a host family in Antigua and spent their free time exploring the area: from museums to lakes to volcanoes, the two friends explored - and photographed - every corner of Ruth’s childhood home. With Ruth’s help, studio art major Nora landed a teaching internship through the same company, Maximo Nivel. Thanks to Sweet Briar’s Grants for Engaged Learning, which provide up to $2,000 per student, she was also able to fund part of her flight. Ruth met with career services director Barb Watts to confirm that it was a good organization to go through - and to start the application process.
“Some classes are rigorous, however the knowledge I have gained has made me more confident and fierce.” “Sweet Briar has taught me to be ambitious and seek opportunities, which is how I was able to find the internship with Maximo Nivel,” Ruth told us. Each week during CORE 130, students heard from different women leaders. The class is part of the College’s new leadership core curriculum. So, what exactly brought her back to Guatemala from her new life in Maryland - and the comfy campus of Sweet Briar - more than a decade later? Ruth says it was a dinner with Joan Parker and Susan Richiedei, who spoke in last year’s CORE 130 - Women and Gender in the World class, that inspired her to look into international opportunities.
“I am grateful for how far I have come with the help of many, especially my father, other family and friends.” “Guatemala can be a dangerous country to live in, so now I have more understanding for why the adoption happened,” Ruth says. Ruth spent about two years at the orphanage after briefly living with her grandmother, who died shortly after her father gave her up. “I have been asked by many where I am from, and their responses are, ‘You will forever be Guatemala.’ Some are ashamed to say they are from Guatemala or of a certain culture because of the stories told or the standing of the country, but not me.” “It’s a little heartbreaking to read and hear the news of how corrupted the country has been and continues to be, but I hope that someday there will be change,” she wrote in an email. It made their visit all the more special, she added - and educational. I know four with whom I was friends when I was there.” Ruth didn’t realize elections would be taking place while the two were there. “We played with nine girls who are left, and there are three boys. Having friend Nora with her made it an unforgettable experience. Ruth is thankful she got to see her home country through new eyes and reunite with her Semillas de Amor family. “Now I am embracing the beauty of Guatemala and its people.” “When I was adopted, I was uneducated and did not know much about my own culture and country,” she admitted. And the business major and political science minor had a lot to take in. “I feel incredible!” Ruth told us in June after arriving in Guatemala. An internship through Maximo Nivel with Asociación Transiciones, a microbusiness that builds wheelchairs, brought her back to the place she had been adopted from in 2007: Semillas de Amor (“Seeds of Love”), an orphanage just outside Antigua.Ĭlassmate Nora Florio came along to witness the homecoming - and to complete her own internship. Eleven years after leaving Guatemala, Sweet Briar student Ruth Lechner ’21 finally returned home this summer.