REFLECTIONS FROM A GRACE SCHOLAR: DANAI MANDEBVU

Tell us about your decision to study outside of your home country.

Hi! My name is Danai Mandebvu. I was born and raised in Harare, Zimbabwe and have been studying at Hope College in Holland, Michigan in the United States since August 2021. I am almost twenty three years old and I am a junior (or a third year student) pursuing a double major in Theatre and Global Studies.

My decision to study in the United States came from my passion for performance. I knew leaving high school that I wanted to pursue a career in the arts in some capacity and I was well aware of how unpopular my decision would be to the people around me. I had enough experience in music and drama at high school level to believe that I wanted to get into an artistic field regardless of how difficult and unstable they are as a career choice. I took a lot of time to think about the path I wanted to take and the degree I wanted to pursue while applying to colleges and universities with the help of Rebecca Mano – a renowned college advisor in Zimbabwe. During this process, I was working as a teaching assistant at USAP Community School in Goromonzi, Zimbabwe which opened the door to me receiving help with my college application process from Mrs. Mano.

I applied to ten different institutions in the United States with the knowledge that without financial aid there was no guarantee that I would be able to go to university at all. Part of my decision to study in the United States came from a desire to be granted a scholarship at a liberal arts college that would allow me to explore my passion for the arts. This would lessen the financial burden on my family and ensure I would go to college. Thankfully, I received a tuition scholarship to attend Hope College at the eleventh hour which eased the financial burden but still left the remaining cost of room and board and other expenses which was still too high to attend. It was only upon receiving the Grace Scholarship from the Philanthropic Ventures Foundation that the gap in cost could be bridged and tertiary education became a certainty for me. I look back at that period of time as a miracle in the truest sense where a combination of events made my experience possible and without any of those events I may not be where I am now.

Was it difficult transitioning to a different culture?

The great miracle of getting to college was met with the harsh reality of culture shock which I have spent the last couple of years trying to understand and move through. The best way I have been able to articulate adjusting to my new environment in the US from Zimbabwe is that it felt like living in a house for years then being blindfolded and opening your eyes to find that every detail had been changed only slightly. I felt off centre for a while but that period taught me some of the greatest lessons of my life: to be appreciative of my Zimbabwean culture and identity, to be adaptable and open to new experiences and to connect with people beyond differences.

The riches I have gained from my time abroad have birthed rich friendships and connections, an appreciation and acceptance of the ways moving countries changed me, and opportunities which were the real reason I moved in the first place. The connections I have made come from the theatre department, international student community, residential life program that I am a part of as a residential assistant and the print and mail office where I work on-campus.

What is your greatest accomplishment at school thus far?

Since coming abroad, I have been featured on the Dean’s list three times, been invited to attend an arts and humanities leadership retreat and received two awards in the theatre department. I have performed as a lead actor in three college productions, which led me to be thrice nominated to participate in the Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship Competition performed at the Kennedy Center for American College Theatre Region 3 Festival, one of which resulted in me winning a few hundred dollars as the runner-up in the competition finals. I have also performed in a production at this same festival in Flint, Michigan at their invitation last month. Through a workshop at this same festival, I was selected to attend a fellows program at the Kennedy Centre in Washington D.C about theatre management in January 2023 which was covered in a summer publication of my college’s magazine that did a summer feature on my experience there.

Additionally, I have had the privilege of having poetry published in a school literary magazine called Opus and performing spoken word poetry at events connected to the Black Student Union and Pan-African Student Association. The international community I have been exposed to at Hope has fanned my desire to continue to travel which has led me to study Theatre abroad in London this semester through IES Abroad which is where I am now. I write this blog from a little café in London that I wandered into after attending classes at the IES Centre and I admit, I would not be here having an amazing experience and meeting amazing people without the connections I have built at Hope College in Holland.

I see the Grace Scholarship as the final piece of the puzzle that allowed me to begin my college education and has urged me forward semester after semester on this journey to make the most of my opportunities so that I have something to give back to the world. I have been blessed so that I can be a blessing and as the blessings continue with every opportunity I continue to reach for proficiency and excellence that I can use to reach out and help those around me.