Kaitlyn Wilson from Randolph, Tenn., a junior Secondary Education major with a concentration in English, finds the beach in the afternoon to be a very relaxing place to complete reading assignments. Before dropping the paper and running off to find out how in the world anyone could have possibly missed a beach on this campus, read on.
Wilson has been spending her afternoons on a private beach on Saint Thomas. John Brewers Bay Beach is owned by the University of the Virgin Islands, UVI, where Wilson is studying abroad this semester.
According to the UVI website, “The University of the Virgin Islands (UVI) lies in the heart of the beautiful Caribbean. Although UVI is located in one of the most popular vacation spots in the world, it offers far more than just sun, sand, sea and palm trees. The UVI experience is uniquely multi-cultural, international, entrepreneurial and intellectually stimulating. UVI provides a vital and exciting environment for educating future leaders of the global 21st century community.”
Wilson, who recently turned 20 years old, grew up along the Mississippi River with her family. Her father currently serves as the Covington Chief of Police and her mother teaches first grade at Drummonds Elementary School. She has three brothers, one of which, Neil, is a UTM alumnus and a sister, Emily Kate, who is a UTM alumna.
While at UTM she has served as both the SGA Vice-President for the Freshman Council and a Student Ambassador. She loves reading, listening to music, sewing, hanging out with friends and actually enjoys working as well.
Although right now Wilson is thoroughly enjoying herself in the Virgin Islands, she is singing UTM’s praises.
“I love the fact that Education majors get to go into classrooms almost immediately after being accepted into the program. This allows the student to decide whether or not he or she still has interest in the profession after seeing what all it takes to be a teacher,” Wilson said.
UVI is small, not unlike UTM, but seems much bigger because of the mountains and hills the students have to climb to get to and from certain buildings on campus. The class sizes at UVI vary from three people to about 20 people at most. At UTM there are a few classes with sizes as low as three people but the majority of classes have sizes that range somewhere between 15 to 70 people.
There are many other differences between Saint Thomas and the US, specifically Martin. Such as, public transportation on Saint Thomas is called the Safari and costs $1 if traveling to the city, which is sparsely populated and $2 if traveling to the country, which is densely populated. The term city is commonly referred to the densely populated areas and the term country is commonly referred to the sparsely populated areas in the US, which carries the exact opposite meaning on Saint Thomas. On Saint Thomas the manner in which people commonly greet each other is quite different from the manner many in Martin are accustomed to using.
“In greeting an islander, you do not say ‘Hello’ or ‘Hi’ because they consider that to be lazy and rude. Instead, you say ‘Good Morning,’ ‘Good Afternoon’ or ‘Good Night.’ Islanders do not like American arrogance, so being boastful is not something to show off down here,” Wilson said.
Not counting the private beach, a couple of other differences between UVI and UTM would be the golf course and UVI’s open-air café that is only cooled by circulating fans. Whether it’s a cafeteria with air conditioning on a really hot day or one with only fans to keep cool, life is full of choices and opportunities, which are not always obvious and sometimes don’t turn out to be quite what they seemed at first glance.
“If you are presented with opportunities, don’t be scared to check into them. Doing your research on the opportunity does not mean that you are committed to it. Who knows, that opportunity just may send you to the Virgin Islands,” Wilson said.
Learn more about UVI by visiting their website at www.uvi.edu. Keep up with Wilson’s adventures while she studies abroad in the Virgin Islands by following her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/kaitlyn.wilson5454. Go the Student Reaps Benefits photo gallery to view more photos.
