American students are afforded numerous opportunities whilst attending their respective universities, and frequently one of the most important opportunities is the chance to study abroad in a foreign country. For me, the chance to study the architecture, culture, and art of Italy was the opportunity of a lifetime. There is no way to understate the value of an on-sight teaching experience and the benefits that come with such an experience. Learning while traveling, exploring and experiencing a completely different way of life is indeed an opportunity that is priceless.
The choice to study in Italy is something that was very simple to me. Italy is a country that is relatively new in it’s unification and this fact is what presents it as such a diverse culture. Moving from one city to the next, going North to South, or East to West will force you to take in a completely new scenery, landscape, dialect, cuisine, and way of life from place to place. From the canals of Venice, to the “Sassi” cave-dwellings of Matera, to the ancient Roman and Papal city of Rome itself, one can only begin to barely understand how the people of Italy, while very different in terms of regional tradition, have been able to unite and form a singular country and national identity.
