Rabia Rafiqzadah would not describe herself as an extrovert.

“Honestly, I’m a really shy person,” Rafiqzadah admitted.

Which makes it that much more incredible that in the fall, the Penn State Brandywine junior found herself welcoming thousands of incoming first-year students throughout the Penn State campuses, writes Amanda Ayako Ota for Penn State Brandywine.

“What I expected was to be a new student orientation (NSO) leader of just Brandywine, but then COVID happened,” Rafiqzadah explained. “So then that small thing turned into me mentoring thousands of students across campuses because we did this huge virtual thing.”

The experience convinced the communications major to stay at Brandywine in pursuit of her four-year degree and to graduate at the campus.

As a first-year student, she benefited from Brandywine’s New Student Orientation, the Cubs to Lionz Mentoring Group, and a pilot first-year seminar program.

“The first day of school I felt so much more prepared than the average student who would not have taken that course and because of that, I was able to help out other freshmen,” Rafiqzadah said.

She appreciates Brandywine’s smaller campus that helps her form one-on-one relationships.

And she’s grateful to Kimeta Straker, coordinator of student success; and Christine Brown, associate teaching professor and coordinator of the Brandywine Learning Center, that have helped her.

Rafiqzadah started as a marketing student but struggled with statistics. It was Brown who convinced her to change her studies from marketing to communications.

Now Rafiqzadah appreciates how the peer mentoring program lets her pass on her experience to help other new students.  

“I know myself, I would never ask for help and would always deal with things on my own if I could. So when I see these new students, I can tell who’s struggling, I can recognize things in them that I’ve seen in myself and offer to help them.”

She’s grateful to have professors she can trust to share what she’s going through in her college life.

“You’ll say one thing to your professor and they’ll give you back 10 solutions in return and that’s just something that I really love about this place,” Rafiqzadah said.

Find out more about what Penn State Brandywine has to offer.