International Student’s Success Leads to Employment

Anna Elizabeth Scade Garcia is graduating with a degree in Interior Design, but that wasn’t her original intention.

As an international student from Spain, Scade Garcia came to SDSU to pursue a degree in music with an emphasis in voice. But just three days prior to the add/drop deadline in the beginning of her freshman year, on a whim, she decided to take an art class.

She calls it the best decision she ever made. There she discovered her passion for interior design and never looked back.

Scade Garcia decided to double major in both music and interior design. Since then, she has experienced both academic and professional success. In addition to attending school full time and commuting daily from Julian, CA, she has interned at three different interior design and architecture firms, eventually landing a permanent, paid position. Though she still feels like she has a lot to learn, her goal is to transform people’s lives through interior design and to start her own firm one day.

She is grateful for having had the opportunity to study at SDSU and credits her interior design professor, Phillip Matzigkeit, as being the most influential force on her academic career. Though she was a double major, commuted three hours to and from school every day, and got very little sleep, she says it was all worth it. She advises future students to find a way to make a difference in the world, break through their limits and work hard every single day. They won’t regret it.

The content within this article has been edited by Lizbeth Persons.