While many students were busy adjusting to the old routine of school, Bella Burke ‘19 immersed herself in a completely new culture alongside four other Blake sophomores below including Alyssa Story and Will  Taylor while attending Swiss Semester in Zermatt, Switzerland.

      Burke and her peers were away for three months during first semester. Burke says of her experience, “It was cool to get away from Blake, I’ve been going here my whole life and it was  interesting to see how another school would function.”

     Though she says her time at Swiss was ”incredible” the one thing she missed the most from America is “Domino’s pizza. [I missed it] so much, it was the first thing I had when I came back.”

    Ashlyn Kehoe ‘19 also attended Swiss Semester and speaks of her initial struggle, one not pizza based. She says, “I was nervous about it the whole summer. When I first got there I was like. ‘What am I doing? I don’t want to be here. How did I even get here!’ But then you realize that everyone who goes to Swiss Semester basically loves it.” After her nerves steadied, Kehoe spoke of the highlights 

     “I loved the people there and how close the teachers were with the students–they’re like teachers and parents and camp counselors all in one. People would go in at three in the morning and they would make you tea.”

     Paige Bernstein ’19 says, “Every day in the middle of the school day we got to hike or ski for like 5 hours which was a cool break from classes.”

     Bernstein mentions  the benefits of being abroad saying, “It made me realize all of the type of people that exist, yes here at Blake there [are]a variety of people, but everyone is similar in their views. It helped me understand   the world is a much bigger place than Blake.”

      Students at Swiss Semester come from all over the world, from schools alongside the East Coast to The American School in London.