What and where to study?
I still see my house full of brochures from different universities: American, Spanish, French and English; I was about to graduate from the French Lyceum in New York. At 16 I had to make a big decision: What shall I study and where do I do it? I could not count on our dear friend google, because at that time he was "in diapers."
I felt overwhelmed. I argued a lot with my parents. Each one wanted different things for me and I didn’t know what I wanted at all. Deciding seemed like an impossible mission. In the end I got lucky. I got accepted to Columbia University and stayed in New York. At the time, I would have given anything to have access to a single source of reliable information and someone who could have provided more insight into my situation.
Years later, when working on postgraduate admissions at the Politecnico di Milano in the interviews, I realized that each of the candidates could relate to the same doubts and fears that I had when I applied to university. The incredible thing is that the fears of the candidates are always the same, no matter their age: which study program is right for me? Will I be accepted? How am I going to finance my studies? Will I like living outside my home country? Away from my family and friends? Will I get a job when I finish my program?