Hello!

My name is Carlisle Turner, and I am currently a freshman in the Swanson School of Engineering at Pitt. I am majoring in Civil Engineering, with a goal to make cities more sustainable in the future. I am from Pittsburgh, about a 10 minute bus ride from Oakland.

I have always been enthralled with traveling the world, and I am lucky enough to have had many opportunities to do so. My family believes in the benefits of seeing and learning about the world, and so we have gone on many trips to various countries such as Japan and France. In addition, I was a foreign exchange student in France my junior year of high school, and was able to travel extensively around Europe while I was there. However, this year abroad did nothing to quench my thirst for experiencing new cultures, and only left me wanting more.

I knew I wanted to study abroad while at Pitt, but didn’t expect to have the opportunity until after sophomore year. When I first learned about the Pitt Plus3 program, I knew it was for me. The idea of combining business and engineering themes into one program was appealing to me because as an engineer, I will be required to consider both the technology and the business. There were so many interesting locations for Pitt Plus3, but I immediately knew that I wanted to go to Vietnam. Vietnam has such a different culture from any that I’ve ever experienced before, and I knew that I wanted to go. Even though we will be very busy on this trip, I hope that I will get the chance to immerse myself in Vietnam and all it has to offer. I am so excited to for this program to begin, and I know that it will be an amazing, life-changing journey.