Camille Dungo, an 18-year-old first-year student from Warren, NJ, believes that attending Rutgers-Newark has been a life-changing experience for her—thanks to the school’s multicultural student body.
“Coming from a predominately white, all-girl Catholic high school, I walked into Newark knowing that it would be very different for me,” Dungo said. “I had this fear inside myself that I would not be able to interact with the other cultures because I was not used to being surrounded by various ethnicities.”
Dungo attended high school at Mount Saint Mary Academy in Watchung, New Jersey for two years and lived in the Philippines for 16 years with her relatives. She came to live in the United States to join her mother, stepfather, and stepsister. Additionally, she also hoped for better opportunities in work and education.
When she compares life in the United States and the Philippines, she sees differences in people’s behavior.“ Individuals in the Philippines are more conservative and indecisive with their choices because they always think of others before themselves,” she said. “In America, everyone seems so outspoken and they just listen to themselves when they want to pursue something. And in Newark, this is what I mostly saw in people.”
Still, Dungo enjoys attending college in Newark because of all the social and educational opportunities the city offers. She never thought she would come to embrace Rutgers-Newark, but she has.
“I really like it here. I went to attend Rutgers-Newark, not just because of my program (2+2 Engineering major), but mainly because I hear this campus is one the most diverse in the United States,” she said. “Many people perceive Newark in a negative light because of the media but I personally think that people need to learn about and understand the city before making their own early assumptions.”
Anne P. Rivera is a Rutgers-Newark student. Her report is part of an occasional series on Newark's impact on the education of Rutgers-Newark students.
