Anna Pfoertsch '18

1. Please tell us a little about yourself!

I was born in Germany and decided to go to Wellesley College, following two of my aunts who also studied there. Although I joined as class of 2018, I ended up graduating early in 2017 having majored in Media Arts and Sciences and minored in Chinese Language and Culture.

2. Why did you decide to become a Chinese Language and Culture minor? How did it shape your experience at Wellesley?

I lived in China for three years and was immersed in the language and culture there. I wasn't able to continue studying Chinese for the rest of my high school career when I moved back to Germany so I was excited to see such an expansive Chinese department at Wellesley! I wasn't planning on taking too many classes, however I received so much encouragement from my instructor and the TA that I just kept taking more classes and decided to make it official by minoring in Chinese. Studying Chinese allowed me to not only learn more about East Asian culture, history, and language, but I was also able to make some of my closest friends during class where we joked about our favorite foods or hobbies in Chinese.

3. What are you doing now?

I now work as a Program Manager at Microsoft Cloud in Seattle, building and managing projects for enterprise customers.

4. How has your Wellesley experience and your minor influenced your life/career after college?

Learning a new language is a valuable skill as it not only creates a new channel of communication, but opens your mind to new cultural ideas and experiences. I like to think that my experience in learning other cultures and languages allows me to be more creative when problem-solving and to think outside of the norm. I am also fortunate to be working on a global product, so it is not uncommon for me to work with counterparts in China, and even have to deal with Chinese language translation issues. I am the only one in the office able to decipher Chinese characters, so I'm often called over to help resolve issues for our international products.