This past Wednesday I attended the Rose Cafe and heard Andre Simores discuss Brazil’s culture and natural landscape. I have never traveled outside of the US or Canada, so I found this to be very interesting. Hearing Andre discuss his country was very intriguing. He pulled up pictures to show us what the different areas of Brazil looked like. These pictures varied from dense rain forests to desert like regions. I had no idea that Brazil had an environment with such a high amount of variation. It was also interesting to hear about the school systems and how the public colleges are the most prestigious. This is the opposite of what is true in the US. Andre explained that those who make it into the public universities mostly come from private schools. So even though University is free, it is mostly the wealthy that go to the public universities. This was an interesting concept to me. This limits higher education to only those that can afford a private school tuition.

Overall, I found this talk to be very interesting. It was nice to learn about another culture and their perspectives on certain things such as education.