I studied the Master "Atlantic Studies in History, Culture and Society" from 2017 to 2020 at Leibniz University. I had previously studied the interdisciplinary bachelor's degree (Spanish/History), but what I lacked during the bachelor's degree was an in-depth examination of the content, which was often only treated superficially. Didactic content interested me rather less, which is why I finally decided to choose a master's program that focused completely on the content of topics that interested me personally very much or still do. I have never regretted this decision. The Atlantic Studies master's program allows students to delve into their preferred areas of interest at a scholarly level. In my case, it was specifically literature, linguistics, and history in the Latin American and Spanish context. My master's thesis ended up being a mixture of historical studies as well as linguistics, and I consider this opportunity to combine different disciplines to be the greatest strength of the program, which sets it apart and differentiates it from other programs. Many trips and internships abroad (including a study abroad in Costa Rica, a research trip to Cuba, and an internship in Barcelona) also helped me decide where to go and what career to pursue. Today, I live and work in Barcelona, Spain. Living in Barcelona had always been my dream. Through my studies and my stays in many different countries, I became more and more aware of where I would like to live and work later. I completed an internship in Barcelona in 2019 at a language school where I worked as a German teacher. I liked the environment and the work so much that I decided to move to Barcelona and continue working at the language school after completing my master's thesis, which is about the Catalonia conflict. Due to my organizational skills, my linguistic knowledge as well as skills in dealing with people, I was "promoted" relatively quickly and have held the post of administrative director of the language school since December 2020. Certainly, this post has less to do with my studies and the contents of the master's degree, but I still think that the master's degree is a great help to me today. The language skills alone, which I acquired with the help of the master's degree through stays abroad and reading texts in different languages, are very useful to me today. I bring content that I covered during the master's program into the courses. For example, we organize theme nights that allow the students to talk about current topics in German (e.g. the Ukraine war, the current situation in Venezuela or the presidential elections in Brazil). At the moment, we are developing the Latin American market for us and many of our students come from Latin America. Here, too, the content and knowledge of my studies help me, as I have studied the history of Latin America in great depth and can use this knowledge when communicating with potential students and pupils. Many of my students are often amazed that I have so much knowledge and are also pleased with my interest in their culture and country. And ultimately, the master's degree and especially my master's thesis have helped me to engage more with the city and region in which I now live. I understand many things better and can understand processes, reactions, prejudices and actions in a completely different way. This is one of the most important things I have learned from studying and it helps me every day. I would study the Master again and again, because I had a lot of fun with my studies and enjoyed the time very much.

Alessandra Guhr