Forewords

“I feel like I lived an entire year in a semester,” says Duda, who started out in journalism before shifting her major to advertising, public relations, and marketing communications. To catch up after her late arrival to campus, and adapt to a new educational setting, she studied nonstop. “It was very different from the experiences I had in public school in Brazil, and I felt so behind because everyone had been here before me. I forgot that I needed to sleep and eat well, things like that. I didn’t have a life. I just studied all the time.”

In the residence hall where she lived, people knew Duda as “the girl from the study lounge,” the place she tended to spend most of her time. Things hit a low point for her midway through the semester: “I was so tired of feeling behind,” she remembers. She approached a professor she trusted, someone who always asked her how she was doing. “Literally, what helped me most was asking for help,” shares Duda.

The professor told Duda that what she was experiencing was normal and directed her to a few helpful resources. “I went to CAPS, and it was amazing. They helped me get extensions for my classes,” she says. With the support of additional faculty and staff, coupled with tutoring services, by the end of the semester, she earned straight As. She was also inducted into IC’s Oracle Society, and received the African-Latino Society Memorial Scholarship, which awards a student who has worked to influence and promote the academic, political, social, economic, and social welfare of students of color at IC and in the greater Ithaca community.

She had also discovered a new rule to live by: “Ask for help when you need it. It’s a self-love act,” advises Duda, who now knows what she’s capable of and always prioritizes her mental health. “I was so proud of myself because I saw my improvement, and the professors were also able to recognize it. That was very important to me. I feel like IC is an incredible environment if you want to learn and grow as a person.”

Duda infuses her creativity, resilience, and ambition into every project she undertakes. On top of her roles as a resident assistant, new student programs assistant, and community outreach manager for The Ithacan, she is a content creator who has drawn a community of over 270,000 followers. Her Instagram, TIkTok, and YouTube posts cover—among other subjects—college life in the United States as an international student from Brazil.

During Duda’s first semester, she and a group of her friends launched the Brazilian Students Association, an IC chapter of a student-led organization that seeks to share Brazilian culture abroad. “We create community for students like us. It means a lot to me. The Brazilian community here is not that big, but we’re like family,” says Duda, who notes that many students in the organization are grateful for the chance to speak in Portugese.

“One of my biggest dreams is to create more opportunities for education in Brazil because education transformed my life, so I really want to give back.”