Fiorella joins the call from a four-person dorm room, an American and Belizean flag hanging together in the background. She is calling from Santa Ana, a city in the province of San Jose, Costa Rica. Over 3,000 miles from her native Tobatí, Fiorella is living in Costa Rica as the recipient of a prestigious full-ride scholarship to United World Colleges, an international network of schools and colleges providing the International Baccalaureate. For the next two years, Fio will represent Paraguay at UWC Costa Rica, finishing her high school career alongside students from around the world.
Fio hails from a town “on the edge of the forest” in Jhuyvaty, Tobatí. Despite coming from a rural and isolated part of Paraguay, she knew from the time she was young that she wanted to study in another country. This desire was cemented upon her entrance to the Colegio Privado Reinaldo Macchi, where she met Yliane Cabrera Cano, an older Macchi student who had won a scholarship to attend UWC Thailand. She thought: “if Yliane can do it, what’s stopping me?” After five years at the Macchi School, she applied to the program, undergoing a rigorous 7-step process that included a personal interview, psychological evaluation, and even a “co-living” weekend in which applicants were evaluated on qualities such as teamwork and problem solving. Ultimately, she was selected to join the UWC Costa Rica program, which is the only program in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Fiorella Jazmín Melgarejo Esquivel
Since her arrival in August of 2026, Fio has settled into her new home, adapting to a bilingual IB program and a fully residential campus. She credits the Macchi School with providing her a solid foundation in English, which was an advantage in her adjustment to an English-language curriculum. The Macchi School is the only high school in Tobatí that provides English language classes for all grade levels. Another aspect of UWC is its cultural and social diversity. Each of Fio’s roommates hails from a different country, with English being their only common language. Her experience interacting with the foreigners who come as Team Tobatí volunteers every March prepared her for such cross-cultural collaboration and has encouraged her to push herself outside her comfort zone. As a part of the March Trip, Macchi School students interact with American high-schoolers from Connecticut and Los Angeles. During this time they practice their language skills, share their respective cultures, and many go on to form friendships that last for years. For many of them, including Fio, these relationships teach them magnitudes about navigating cultural differences, linguistic barriers, and social customs.
We asked Fiorella where she envisions herself in five years. She replied with confidence: “likely at university, doing something in the humanities”. As a UWC student, she has a tremendous opportunity before her when it comes to higher education: UWC’s partnership with the Davis UWC Scholars Program (the world’s largest privately funded international undergraduate scholarship program), virtually guarantees a full-ride scholarship to one of their U.S. partner universities upon admission. Therefore, as a UWC Alumna, a 4-year U.S. university education will be financially accessible.
This means everything to Fiorella and her family. Her grandparents never finished school and her mother didn’t get the chance to attend university. Fio is the first woman in her family to pursue higher education, to study internationally, to board a plane, and to see the ocean. She is the first to see these horizons and wants to be the first to share them with her family. Once she starts her career, she can’t wait to bring her advancements back to her family and community, showing future students that these opportunities exist and are achievable.
Fio is part of a growing network of Macchi alumni who continue to excite, encourage, and inspire youth in Tobatí. When asked about what motivates Fiorella to continue her studies, she didn’t miss a beat, crediting firstly her future, then her family, and finally, her future family. These are the people that keep her going, that keep her striving to prove that todo es posible. We have no doubt that for Fiorella, everything and more is possible.
