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Before getting to Tufts, I had already heard of how collaborative and helpful everyone on campus was. But I was really amazed to experience that myself.

Since the first week of classes, people had this eagerness to help each other. For example, I had some trouble in the beginning of Comp 15 (Data Structures) to get used to the syntax of C++, and I was very lost in the first assignments. My friend Duc (thanks man!) helped me a lot; regardless of how close to the deadline we were, he stopped his project to answer whatever questions I had. That was one of the several instances, involving me or not, that I saw that, for the students here, other people’s needs are at least as important as their own.

In another instance, I was close to the deadline of submitting a physics homework, but I didn’t know how to solve a problem. When I was walking to the submission boxes, I saw this student I didn't know very well at that time, but that I knew was in my class. We said hello to each other and I asked if he could help me with that question. Nofal Ouardaoui (shoutout to him!), who I got to know better later, stopped and helped me right away.

It is also rewarding to be able to help someone in a similar manner. This past semester, a similar situation happened, but I was the person asked for help. I made sure to help the other student as best as I could.

People here collaborate regardless of whether they know each other. They are naturally willing to help, and know the other Tufts students are like that. The other day I was walking in Halligan (where the computer science department is) and this student asked me: “Have you taken Comp 15? I have got some questions.” I happily helped him as I could.

During my first days here (almost an year ago!), I heard everyone saying the same thing: “everyone here is so nice!”, “everyone is so helpful!”. It feels very good to be in a place where we see everyone valuing other people so much, and where we know if we need help, we can easily find someone eager to help.

Picture: Johan Blomström ("Hand"). Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ No changes made.