Master of Arts in International Studies ’21
National Security Language Initiative for Youth
(NSLI-Y) Program
Freya has been fascinated by language her whole life. She was born in Hong Kong and grew up in Costa Rica learning Spanish and English simultaneously. After moving to the U.S., she was struck by how many doors opened to her just by virtue of speaking a language other than English. With that in mind, she started studying Mandarin. As a junior in high school, she studied for a year at the Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages in Kaohsiung, Taiwan through the National Security Language Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y). While in Taiwan, she worked on her accent, learned to tolerate stinky tofu, and forged relationships that she will treasure forever.
Her time with NSLI-Y was her first meaningful look into the world of international relations. In Taiwan she decided two things: first, she wanted to become a Foreign Service Officer; and second, she wanted to complete her bachelor’s degree abroad. She felt that the outside perspective unique to living abroad afforded her valuable and relatively rare insight into U.S. diplomatic relations.
After returning to the U.S., she packed her bags once more and moved to Europe, where she recently completed her Bachelor of Arts in Diplomacy at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. At the University of Groningen, Freya had the opportunity to design her own three-year intensive degree and worked closely with her professors on several research projects as well as hand-picked courses with the aim of developing practical skills relevant to a career in the State Department. She feels learning about U.S. politics and foreign policy from a European perspective added new depth to her insight on the world’s understanding of the U.S. as an international actor. This is something she finds fascinating as an aspiring Foreign Service Officer. Freya looks forward to continuing to broaden her understanding of diverse international perspectives in Nanjing.
Freya learned about the Hopkins-Nanjing Center through her NSLI-Y alumni network and is ecstatic that it will be her next step. She feels the Hopkins-Nanjing Center offers the perfect combination of both academic and cultural enrichment.
Joe Wojciechowski Peace Corps
Master of Arts in International Studies ‘20
Joe Wojciechowski started studying Mandarin in his first year of undergraduate studies at Ursinus College. This decision to study Mandarin was made on a whim, as he figured a Chinese course was as good as any for completing the school’s language requirement. Little did he know the consequences of this decision would reverberate outwards even to this day, culminating in Joe living in Mainland China for over three years. After studying Mandarin for three years at Ursinus College, Joe decided to study abroad in the Nanjing CIEE program; this would be his first contact both with Chinese life and the Hopkins-Nanjing Center. The concept of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center left an indelible mark on Joe, and he decided from that point on to devote his future studies to Chinese culture and politics.
After graduating from Ursinus College with a BA in History, Joe enrolled in the U.S. Peace Corps China program. In this program, Joe spent over two years as a vocational English teacher in Tongren, Guizhou. Tongren is a tier-5 city with a population around 300,000. As an inland city, Tongren had largely been left out of the economic boom experienced in coastal areas, and this gave Joe a China experience quite unlike one many other foreigners’ experience. As one of only five Americans living in the city, most of Joe’s day-to-day interactions were entirely in Mandarin or the local dialect. Learning to acclimate to life in Tongren was not easy, as Joe was forced to confront his fundamental preconceptions about China. In turn, Joe’s presence in Tongren led many in his local community to also confront their own biases regarding the United States. This experience gave Joe a high-level of cultural and linguistic understanding. Peace Corps allowed him to view a different China than most; where many foreigners are limited to frequent interactions with English speakers or bilingual academics, Joe primarily interacted with average Chinese people. This exposure to everyday Chinese life has given Joe a deep appreciation for many aspects of Chinese culture often overlooked by others.
After completing Peace Corps, Joe returned to Nanjing – the place where his interest in China started. He is currently pursuing his Master of Arts in International Studies at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center and is eager to continue pursuing a more comprehensive understanding of Chinese life, culture, and politics.
Nicholas A. HendersonMaster of Arts in International Studies ’21
Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship Recipient
In 2015, dizzy, sensitive to bright light, and with a massive headache, Nicholas (Nick) walked off the football field for the last time his junior year. A student athlete at the time, Nick had been studying Chinese for two and a half years and had just sustained a career-ending concussion, sidelining him from football and Chinese studies. Nick had dreams of attending the Hopkins-Nanjing Center and studying Chinese at the highest levels, but now, that dream was in jeopardy.
After dropping Chinese language and fighting through a semester of depression, and concussion protocol, he bounced back, earning both the PACIE-Asia Institute Global Education Scholarship and the Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship in the process. Because of their assistance, Nick was awarded the opportunity to increase his Chinese proficiency, and watched American foreign policy take shape in Shanghai while studying abroad in the spring of 2016. He found the experience so vital to his language development that he chose to stay in China for the summer and continue improving his language proficiency.
Nick returned to the U.S. to finish his undergraduate degree and was subsequently accepted into the esteemed program Princeton in Asia (PIA) program. As a PIA fellow, he spent the past two years in Shanghai as a cultural ambassador for the U.S. and Princeton University, and continued sharpening his language skills in preparation for the Hopkins-Nanjing Center. Nick looks forward to joining his future classmates in Nanjing as a student in the Master of Arts in International Studies program, while continuing to study U.S.-China relations with the goal of facilitating healthy cooperation and competition between the two countries.
