My first week in Buenos Aires, I showed up to my HR internship wearing what I thought was the “right” outfit. Slacks. Button-down. Dress shoes. Back home in the U.S., professionalism often means structure, suits, ties, polished shoes, and a certain stiffness in posture. I walked into the office and immediately realized something: I was overdressed. My coworkers were wearing jeans. T-shirts. Sneakers. The atmosphere felt calm, almost unhurried. People greeted each other with warmth before opening laptops. Coffee conversations blended into work meetings. Productivity wasn’t loud or rigid, it was steady. That moment forced me to confront something I didn’t expect to learn abroad: professionalism is cultural.
As a Psychology major at the University of Michigan, I’ve spent years in large lecture halls where a single class can hold over 200 students. It’s easy to feel like a number in a system that runs efficiently but impersonally. Here in Buenos Aires, both academically and professionally, the scale shifted dramatically. Through my CGIS program, my cohort is about 60 students total, smaller than some of my individual classes back in Ann Arbor. Instead of blending into a sea of faces, I know everyone’s name. Professors recognize my voice. Class discussions feel personal rather than performative. For the first time in my college career, I didn’t feel like I was trying to be seen. I was already seen. That shift, from being a number to making a number, has been one of the most transformative parts of this experience.
Balancing academics with my HR internship has given me a dual lens into Argentine culture. In class, we analyze social systems, history, and identity. At work, I observe workplace norms that prioritize relationship-building just as much as output. Meetings feel collaborative rather than hierarchical. There is structure, but it breathes. As a Black American student studying abroad, I was curious how my identity would shape this experience. What I’ve found is that being abroad heightens your awareness of how you speak, how you dress, how you work, how you move. But instead of feeling pressure to conform, I’ve felt invited to adapt. There’s a difference. Adaptation feels empowering; conformity feels restrictive.
As a Black American student studying abroad, I was curious how my identity would shape this experience. What I’ve found is that being abroad heightens your awareness of how you speak, how you dress, how you work, how you move. But instead of feeling pressure to conform, I’ve felt invited to adapt. There’s a difference. Adaptation feels empowering; conformity feels restrictive.
Buenos Aires has taught me that there are multiple ways to be successful, multiple ways to be professional, multiple ways to belong. Twenty years from now, I won’t just remember the landmarks or the food (though I’ll definitely remember late-night empanadas and weekend walks through Palermo). I’ll remember the internal shift. The realization that the world is wider than one definition of excellence.
If I could offer advice to future CGIS students, it would be this: let yourself be surprised. You might think you know what professionalism looks like. You might think you know how classrooms should function. You might even think you know yourself. But studying abroad stretches those assumptions. Somewhere between your first overdressed internship day and your last small-cohort class discussion, you might find that growth isn’t loud. It’s subtle. It’s cultural. It’s personal. Buenos Aires didn’t just change how I dress for work. It changed how I see scale, space, and myself within both.
Dion Stinson, University of Michigan LSA Junior – Fall 2026, CGIS: Psychology and Humanities in Buenos Aires, Argentina
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