- Student; On Campus
School of Business graduate student Maria Antonieta Marcial ‘08, a native of Ecuador, can’t remember when she didn’t want to study in the United States.
She was thrilled to be accepted into the international business program at Southern New Hampshire University and excited to finally arrive and get settled. What she didn’t anticipate was how much she would miss her family.
“At the beginning, it was very difficult,” she says.
She thought about returning home. Instead, she reached out.
She joined the Association for Cultural Exchange, and became a resident assistant. She worked in the Career Development Office and at the library.
Those affiliations raised her spirits, but she faced other challenges.
“I’d read 20 pages and not understand it, and I was so frustrated,” Maria Antonieta says.
She says her professors, some of whom also were not born in the U.S., encouraged her.
“They said, ‘We’re also coming from other countries. We’re here, and you can do it,”’ she says.
A member of the Delta Mu Delta honor society, Maria Antonieta received her master’s degree in international business in March 2008 and is working on a second master’s, in finance.
She plans to work for an international company before returning to Ecuador to start her own business.
“It all started at Southern New Hampshire University,” she says. “SNHU was the one that opened the doors for me and made three years of my life a marvelous, wonderful, experience.”
