William Cano had a simple and practical plan.
The University of Georgia international affairs major would graduate in Fall 2022 at age 23. Then he would work at The Home Depot for a few months before getting a foreign policy-related master’s degree.
Cano, a Mexican immigrant and son of a single mom, is all about practicality. That’s why he joined the Army at 17, knowing it would help pay for his education.
But as practical as Cano is, he’s also very curious.
So when his girlfriend suggested he delay graduation and consider applying for UGA’s Washington Semester Program, he was intrigued. The program connects students to full-time internships in Washington, D.C., while living and learning in UGA’s Capitol Hill residential facility, Delta Hall.
Cano just made the application deadline for the spring 2023 semester.
“I didn’t think I was going to get in,” he admits. And even if he did, he wasn’t sure he could afford to live in Washington.
Instead, he found that not only had he been accepted into the program, but he was named a Chambliss Fellow, the program’s most prestigious scholarship. The path to D.C. was getting a whole lot easier.
He landed an internship opportunity at the think tank American Foreign Policy Council and then had to decide. Would he stick with his original plan or take a chance in Washington?
“For me, it was just taking that leap so that I didn’t stay stagnant,” Cano AB ’23 says.