Florencia's story

Florencia started attending high school in 2018, in Montevideo.

That year, she suffered bullying from one of her classmates.

“It was constant threats and he was teasing me all the time”.

Despite the rough start, with family support and complaints, the problem was eventually sorted, and Florencia went on to take 2^nd grade.

When Florencia was in 3^rd grade, the pandemic hit, and classes had to be taken online.

“What makes things easier is having good teachers. In high school, I had good teachers who made things easier for me. During the pandemic, it was very complicated and luckily, I had good teachers who helped a lot.”

The following year, Florencia had to change schools to a high school that taught upper secondary education. There, she took 4^th grade.

As time went on and she had to start thinking about what career path to follow, she began thinking about studying Architecture.

“A coworker of my father told him about [vocational school] UTU, which neither my father nor I knew about. He said to him, ‘Why doesn’t she go to the UTU Construction School, which is perhaps better than going to high school?’”

And so she did. The following year, she started her 1^st year at UTU, where she got an education that she felt better equipped her to study Architecture in the future.

Because she had already taken 4^th grade at an upper secondary school, she didn’t have to take all the subjects that year, but only the ones that were specific to Construction UTU.

“I feel that there is more support at UTU than at high school. For example, I always knew that there were tutoring sessions at high school, but I never saw people using them. At UTU, you can see that people do use them. You see people from 6:00 in the morning until 5:00 in the afternoon at UTU because they stay for tutoring sessions or take advantage of computer rooms to finish work.”

“The atmosphere at high school is a bit more hostile. The staff don't pay as much attention as they should [to things happening there], because there are serious things that are overlooked. At UTU, everyone is focused on their own thing and it is calmer.”

This year, Florencia is in her final year of Construction UTU, and looking towards the future.

She wants to go on to study Architecture at university next year.

Pondering about her family's support throughout her educational trajectory and beyond, she says:

“I can choose whatever I want to do (...). As long as it is what I truly like and I don't stop feeling capable, [my family] will always support me.”

This is what her educational trajectory looks like.

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