Misia Letowska

Class of 2026 

Hometown: Chicopee, MA

Major(s): Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences

Campus Involvement: CHC Ambassador, National Student Speech Language and Hearing Association (NSSLHA), Habitat for Humanity

How did you find a sense of community and belonging at CHC and UMass? What experiences or resources helped you feel connected and supported?

Joining the Ambassador team was my first step to building a second home for myself on campus. Through this position, I found mentorship among my supervisors, formed friendships with my coworkers, and began involving myself within the CHC community. Once I started building a support network, my confidence grew and enabled me to find a bigger sense of community on campus; I began reaching out to professors to conduct independent studies, found friendships with the people living in the same building as me, and opened myself to new experiences. Once I started building my confidence, I was amazed at the connections I could make simply by starting conversation with the students and faculty already around me. Now, I can proudly say UMass and CHC have become a second home for me - all thanks to the friendships and community I have found.

What advice would you give to incoming students?

The time you spend at college will be filled with an infinite amount of opportunities. If you choose them to be, these will be opportunities that lead to experiences filled with immense growth, wonderful adventures, and of course, challenges that will only end up making you stronger. At the same time, all this also means that college, and even the idea of college, can be terrifying. If you are an anxious, introverted, and worried incoming college student like I was, my best advice is to prioritize yourself. Think about the person you want to be, the passions you want to pursue, the types of friends you want to make. Then, make choices that you believe will help you reach your goals. Sometimes, this means simply finding the courage to say "hello" to a classmate. Other times, this means applying for that on-campus job you're not confident you will get. You never know what will happen, and more times than not, things usually turn out better than you thought they will be. Believe in yourself and know, there is a community here waiting to welcome you.