Manqi is a second year student from China. As an Experience Industry Management major, she originally chose Cal Poly for its high ranking in tourism, but she will soon be switching to Music as a piano player.
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Reflection
As an international student from China, Manqi mentioned one of her greatest struggles while at Cal Poly has been the lack of belonging with students who share her culture: “Diversity isn’t really a thing at Cal Poly and I can’t really find my fellow Chinese students here.” However, she did say that Cal Poly started to feel like home after her freshman year when she started making new friends with whom she felt comfortable being vulnerable. For example, she stated, “Now I have friends to cry with after my first year.” While she didn’t feel she needed to share the story of her cultural background with her friends to feel at home, she did have to let them into her inner world by sharing her emotions with them. As in the framework detailed by Andenoro et al. (2012), Manqi did tell her story in a sense by constructing a sense of self that could relate her inner emotions to her friends. Though without similar cultural experiences and backgrounds, her friends were able to show their empathy for her by crying with her as they transported themselves into her story and emotional experiences, allowing Manqi to find a home with them (Polkinghorne 2013).
Manqi also indicated feeling a sense of belonging in the International Student [Friendship] Club, which was specifically aided by sharing some of her cultural background and intercultural experiences. As international students at a predominantly white university she has found that they share a lot of similar experiences though they all come from different countries; stories help them convey those experiences to create bonds. Those bonds are indicative of Chung’s concept of cultural empathy, which he describes as “a way of relating interpersonally as well as understanding and communicating across cultures” (p. 156).
At the heart of Manqi’s experience at Cal Poly is “...the existential need of recognition: to be seen, known, and affirmed” (Lawson, 2018, p. 414). Because she has been able to have these needs met through her emotional connections with her personal friends and her shared experiences with other international students, Cal Poly has been able to function as a home for her.
Manqi also indicated feeling a sense of belonging in the International Student [Friendship] Club, which was specifically aided by sharing some of her cultural background and intercultural experiences. As international students at a predominantly white university she has found that they share a lot of similar experiences though they all come from different countries; stories help them convey those experiences to create bonds. Those bonds are indicative of Chung’s concept of cultural empathy, which he describes as “a way of relating interpersonally as well as understanding and communicating across cultures” (p. 156).
At the heart of Manqi’s experience at Cal Poly is “...the existential need of recognition: to be seen, known, and affirmed” (Lawson, 2018, p. 414). Because she has been able to have these needs met through her emotional connections with her personal friends and her shared experiences with other international students, Cal Poly has been able to function as a home for her.