Harvard Portrait Project, MBA Class Of 2022

ISRAT TARIN, MBA ’22

“I wish you were a boy,” my mother would tell me while growing up.

This was difficult for me to hear. I wondered why my gender, which I had no control over, was a cause of disappointment to my mother who loved me so much.

As I grew older, I understood that her words were only out of concern. My mother was a brilliant student. Her recitation of William Wordsworth’s “Daffodils” drew crowds of far-flung villagers to the school grounds. Yet, poverty and patriarchy meant she would be married at the age of sixteen while her brothers were afforded the opportunity to pursue higher education.

She, however, decided that her daughters would have agency. She convinced my father to change the status quo and ensure we had access to the best education.

I, in turn, lapped up every opportunity that I was given and with time learned to ask for opportunities that I wasn’t given. I have gone on to be the ‘first-generation’ in a multitude of areas.

Although there is great pride in being the first, my plan in life is to not become the only. So that mothers can instead tell their daughters: “I wish there were more girls like you.”

 

SARA MATTEI GENTILI, MBA ’22

I don’t recall a moment in my life when I had that comforting feeling of belonging. What I do remember perfectly, is the first time I thought I was odd.

My kindergarten classmates played in the school’s courtyard, and I sat in a corner reading — Little Women by Louisa Alcott — my mother’s favorite book. A kid walked up to me. In an attempt to connect, I shared something about the story I was reading. “You are weird,” said the kid and he turned his back and rejoined the group.

That moment, I realized that I needed to work to fit in. For 15 years I made it my mission. I would study the people surrounding me. What did they like? What were they interested in? How did they speak? I thought the more I knew, the more I could emulate, and the more I would belong.

One day, I realized, no matter how hard I tried, I was an outcast.

So, I stopped trying. I realized that the one person I needed to belong to was myself. It felt liberating. I embraced the things that made me stand out and those became my strengths. So now I graduate with a new mission: being unapologetically myself and showing all weird and odd little girls hiding in corners that they can step out of the shadows and shine.

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