"I feel twice as accomplished when I think about all of the sacrifices and hard work that brought me here. I’m a little incredulous but extremely happy with myself." So says Letizia Gianni, a LUISS graduate in Law, talking about how she felt on June 20 at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, when she was awarded a prize for being one of the five best Italian students at the College of Europe.
It was her latest goal in a journey full of rewards as well as challenges, as she recounts. "After graduating with honors in Labor Law with Professor Roberto Pessi in 2012, I experienced firsthand the enormous difficulty of finding a job that would fully satisfy me." After getting some internship experience, Letizia seemed to have found her place in one of the Big Four, the big global accounting firms. But then, after just 50 days, she got a phone call from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs telling her she had won a partial scholarship to attend the Master of European Law at the College of Europe, Bruges campus. "The news was completely unexpected. It was the second time that I tried to get into the College. The year before I had missed it by a hair."
Letizia describes her experiences last year in Belgium in no uncertain terms as “the most intense ones of my life." Aside from the flexible and rigorous academics, the College of Europe offered "a one-of-a-kind social experiment, in which over 350 students belonging to over 50 different nationalities live together in a beautiful town of only 160,000 inhabitants," and the possibility of taking part in special events, such as the visit of the President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping, and President Barack Obama’s speech at Bozar in Brussels.
A journey that ended with a moving ceremony in June where, aside from the prestigious award of the Ministry, Letizia was touched by an announcement made by the College’s provost: "Professor Monar declared that the promotional materials for the next academic year will feature the judges, Falcone and Borsellino, that were killed by the mafia: a courageous choice that will make students of the College who come from different countries and cultures aware of the stature of these men, who symbolize the struggle to change an unfortunate reality that still plagues our country.”
Now Letizia works as an intern at an international firm in Brussels where she specializes in competition law. But her hopes are centered on what is sure to be "another unique work and life experience: the BlueBook internship at the European commission in the fall, where I will be in DGComp, the Cartels Directorate". Looking back, she does not regret having taken on this challenge, this experience at the College. "I am extremely grateful to all of the people who helped me get to where I am now, first of all, my family.”