The Center for Work and Service recently caught up with Bernice Chan ’16 to follow-up on her internship experience last summer with Asociación Cordobesa de Parálisis Cerebral y Afecciones Similares (ACPACYS) in Córdoba, Spain. The ACPACYS internship is part of the CWS Global Engagement Advanced Projects.
Please give a brief background on yourself and your academic/professional interests.
I am a daughter of Chinese immigrant parents from Brooklyn, New York. At Wellesley, I am the first Ethnic Studies Individual Major and am a part of the Wellesley Academic Action Movement-Siblings Leading Action for Multiculturalism (WAAM-SLAM2), a campus coalition that seeks to bring change to the academy through an established Ethnic Studies Major, Latin@ Studies Minor, multicultural houses, among other reforms. I am also a Mellon Mays Fellow who researches theories of liberation and social change rooted in social movements. I am currently considering graduate school programs in Ethnic Studies and Education and/or doing organizing work and working in community programs for youth of color.
What about the ACPACYS internship drew you to apply?
Before coming to Wellesley, I volunteered a lot with organizations and programs that worked with people with disabilities. I was part of a peer mentorship program in my high school for teenagers with autism where I led arts & crafts activities and a girls empowerment group. I also volunteered at United Cerebral Palsy with deaf adults with cerebral palsy, and More than Words, a program in Chinatown for youth with autism. I was drawn to ACPACYS (Asociación Cordobesa de Parálisis Cerebral y Afecciones Similares) for the opportunity to devote myself entirely to disability advocacy work in a summer internship. I had also studied Spanish for the past 4 years and longed for the opportunity to travel to and live in Spain for the linguistic and cultural immersion. ACPACYS provided the perfect combination.
How did your Wellesley experience contribute to your internship at ACPACYS?
As an intern, I questioned my role as a privileged American student coming into a nonprofit in another country thinking I could make an impact. I questioned my purpose there if after 10 weeks, I would leave. Thus, in my time at ACPACYS, I always had the thought of my role in their community lingering in the back of my mind. These are conversations I had with several Wellesley professors before I left for my internship. One professor advised me that these experiences are about mutual impact. A person who has traveled around the world may still never have more experience than someone who has stayed in the same place all their lives. I was advised that my role as an outsider was to first gain acceptance in their community and to not approach my work with the intention of making an immediate impact. Instead, change is mutual.
Throughout my time in Córdoba, I was also in frequent contact with my mentors from Wellesley in the Spanish, American Studies, and Education Departments. They advised me on making the most of my experience from not being afraid to travel alone to having enough confidence in my Spanish skills despite my level compared to everyone else’s fluency. I am incredibly thankful for my Wellesley professors who were there for me. I was also able to connect with Wellesley students who studied abroad in Córdoba who stayed for the summer and other students who then connected me with American students in the area.
What was a typical day or week like for you as an ACPACYS intern?
As an intern, my schedule changed every day. There were 5 monitors who each ran their own workshop for the consumers from Cooking to Information Technology. Every day, they ran a different workshop. I spent each morning helping the consumers, majority of whom were in wheelchairs, move from the dining room upstairs to the workshops. I loved ACPACYS for its dynamic environment where multiple workshops and activities were happening each moment. On Mondays, I would spend it with Sonia in the Cooking Workshop where we would make a traditional Cordobés dish such as salmorejo. I would assist with the entire recipe process from helping hand out the ingredients- tomatoes, eggs, bread- to working with the consumers who had motor difficulties to slice the tomatoes. Tuesdays, I would be in the Art Workshop with Nuria, Wednesdays in the Communication Workshop with Paqui, Thursdays in Information Technology with Roberto, and Fridays in Psychomotricity with Antonio Bueno. I loved that there was no typical day.
Reflecting on your experience, what were the most valuable parts about the APACYS internship?
I was given the chance to be a part of a community where having cerebral palsy is normalized. It’s very humanizing, for lack of a better word. Outside of the nonprofit, that is rarely the case. After 10 weeks there, I absorbed the culture of the nonprofit. I found myself taking on their sense of humor of making small jokes, and embracing each other. Because I was living with a host family, speaking Spanish every hour of every day, I was fully immersed in the Hispanic culture. People were more blunt than I was used to, they greeted each other with air kisses, and every day was filled with jokes. I loved it.
Another one of the most valuable parts when I started a portrait project called “The Power of Our Voices” or “El Poder de Nuestras Voces” in Spanish. I interviewed over 30 consumers, monitors, caretakers, and took portraits of each of them. The goal of the project was to illuminate the stories of the consumers with cerebral palsy and highlight the diversity within the category of cerebral palsy. I also wanted to emphasize the deep relationships between consumers, monitors and caretakers that I observed in my time there. Not only were the consumers ecstatic that their portraits appeared on Facebook (we would joke that they would become famous in America), but I was able to get to know each of them on an individual level. The project links can be found here and here.
What are some things you learned from being an ACPACYS intern that you wouldn’t have learned otherwise?
I learned that the secrets to living a happy life are to have a sense of humor, and to love and care for others. I found the way some caretakers approached their work with a sense of humor and love to be incredibly contagious and genuine. Every day working there was filled with laughter. In the dining room, for instance, there was a consumer who I would feed lunch to. He had a habit of coughing while eating due to throat restrictions, and the food would come flying out. When this happened, a caretaker would call out, “food for everyone!” and instead of being frustrated that there were food stains on our shirts, we laughed. Because I had gained acceptance into their community, I was able to fully experience ACPACYS.
How should future ACPACYS interns prepare prior to starting their internship?
Embrace the idea that you will be in Spain alone. And that is exciting. You have to be prepared to be flexible and creative as you go, both in terms of traveling to another country and also starting your internship with ACPACYS. I bought my plane ticket to Spain without knowing exactly what my internship schedule would be like and exactly who would welcome me there. On the weekends, I took the longest time to muster the courage to buy a train ticket and travel alone to another city. Don’t be afraid! Bring a notebook to document your adventures, sunscreen, and a water bottle. Also, no matter how good or not good you think your Spanish is, unless you’re a native speaker, it will be lower than everyone else’s there. Embrace this as an opportunity to practice. You can only improve from there.
What do you wish you had known before applying to this internship?
I wish I would have known that Cordobés summers can reach over 110 degrees and that I should bring mosquito spray. Those two are an enough said. I would also have liked to read up more on current events and issues of race in Spain, especially in the south. In my summer there, there was a lot of news about Moroccan immigration and political issues involving the king. I also did not know there was such a sizeable Chinese immigrant population in Córdoba. The would-have’s and should-have’s apply more to being in Spain rather than specifics of ACPACYS. Working with them has been one of the best summers of my life. I would return in a heartbeat if I could.
Interested in applying to this year’s Global Engagement Advanced Project internship with ACPACYS? Applications will be accepted until January 13, 2015 at NOON EST.